


when you say my name

by jaeyongficfest, mfalfanclub



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Baker Taeyong, Fluff, JaeYong - Freeform, M/M, Some angst, Soulmate AU, and many more - Freeform, but i picked a prompt with a heavy premise and that's on me, half of it takes place in a cafe so i can call it a coffeshop au, i tried to go light on the angst, johnkun, music student jaehyun, side ships that will make an appearance include, yuten
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-13
Updated: 2019-11-13
Packaged: 2021-01-30 02:20:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 26,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21420580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaeyongficfest/pseuds/jaeyongficfest, https://archiveofourown.org/users/mfalfanclub/pseuds/mfalfanclub
Summary: Most people see color when they see their soulmate. Jaehyun is one of those people. His soulmate is not.
Relationships: Jung Yoonoh | Jaehyun/Lee Taeyong
Comments: 108
Kudos: 589





	1. Color

Jaehyun had always heard that color starts in your soulmate’s face. He imagined it like a flicker of light: he’d be walking down the street one day, or maybe riding the subway, shades of gray passing him by, and suddenly the gray would be broken by something like a spark, a candle flame. People said that color spreads outward from your soulmate’s face in waves, first overtaking the shades of gray in their hair, clothes, their surroundings, then reaching to the edges of your vision until everything within eyesight has been transformed. Jaehyun had imagined it would feel like stepping out of his own world and into a whole new one, where everything is luminous and exotic and unfamiliar.

The first color that Jaehyun saw was not in his soulmate’s face. When he heard the chime of the café’s entry bell and looked up from his book to the closing glass door, the late March morning was high and the sun struck like a knife through the windows. Jaehyun couldn’t make out the features on the face silhouetted against the light. But the sky through the door behind the face had changed.

_ Blue. _

Johnny said color was like new flavors you never tasted. Like if you went your whole life eating nothing but rice and then some stranger walked across your line of sight and suddenly you were tasting sour, and sweet, and salty, and spicy. Johnny said yellow was like the sharp taste of hard cheese and blue was like a sweet potato. Kun had argued and said that yellow was a sour apple, and blue was deep and mild, like a steamed scallop.

They were both wrong. Colors weren’t like tastes. They were like music. Blue was a wistful dissonant suspended chord, and the red brick building across the street was some Dorian interval, a weird one. The color of the floor of the café was a major tonic triad, the home of a melody, the center. And the color of his soulmate’s hair—it was becoming visible now, as the slim figure moved slowly out of the light from the windows, as Jaehyun’s eyes adjusted to the sunlight’s glare—was candy-sweet, the color of the final chord in an unresolved cadence.

“Are you good?” he heard Ten’s voice say.

He turned his head to Ten, who was sitting across from him. Ten’s skin was a gentler shade of the color of the floor, and his lips were red like the bricks outside, but a hue sweeter. The walls behind his head were a color that Jaehyun didn’t know the name of. It looked like a flat seventh. Fervent. Dynamic.

Ten waved a hand in front of Jaehyun’s face and said, “Hello?”

“Your sweater’s blue,” Jaehyun whispered.

Ten’s mouth fell open.

“Jaehyun, come here a second,” called Kun’s voice from the other side of the café, and both of their heads snapped to the front of the café, where Kun was talking to the boy with the candy hair. Brown. Kun had said he’d dyed his hair brown last month. Brown was strange…somehow delicate and heavy at the same time. So maybe the floor was brown, too…a very warm and rich brown? No. There must be a different name for the color of the floor.

Jaehyun closed his book—the cover was in shades of blue, blue like the sky, and that dancing dynamic color that was a little close to blue—and set it down on the table. He stood up. Ten pointed at Jaehyun and said, “Who just…did you just…”

“Just—one second,” Jaehyun said and wove between tables to the front. The tables were still white, the same color as before. This was somehow both comforting and disappointing. Kun beckoned to him from behind the counter.

“Sorry, Jaehyun, I know your shift doesn’t start till 4,” Kun said, gesturing to the boy whom all the colors were pouring out of, who stood with one hand on the counter and his gaze lowered. “I just wanted to introduce you to the new pastry chef. He’s here early for training with me and then he’ll be training with you later.”

Jaehyun barely heard a word of what Kun said. He was looking into his soulmate’s face for the first time, into a face built like gossamer, like a spiderweb, all fine-spun and artlike; he was seeing that face’s angles and depths in streaming color, first in profile as he stepped behind the counter and then straight-on as he walked to Kun. And he was trying to make eye contact, searching for any glimmer of recognition, any hint of the same awe that Jaehyun was feeling. That his soulmate had seen color too.

But the man didn’t look up. He only gazed at the counter with a small not-smile on his face, the kind that people wear to be polite.

He felt Kun kick his ankle. He jumped and looked up. Kun was glaring at him. He jerked his head towards the boy pointedly. “ _ Say hi _ ,” he mouthed.

Jaehyun frowned, feeling discombobulated. “Uh… Hi.”

Kun gave an impatient blinking eye-roll and said, “Taeyong, this is Jaehyun. He’s a part-timer. Jaehyun, Taeyong.”

“Nice to meet you, Jaehyun,” said Taeyong, and held out his hand.

“Nice to meet you,” said Jaehyun, taking Taeyong’s hand in his. His hand was cold. Everything Jaehyun had imagined about this moment seemed to have been wrong. It wasn’t like leaving behind the life he knew, it wasn’t like stepping into a strange and flickering new world. It was like finding himself, suddenly, in a world where he belonged. A world with Taeyong in it. Taeyong, whose beauty was reflected in the colors around him. Taeyong, who still wouldn’t look at him.

Jaehyun blinked away from his soulmate and found Kun giving him a glower that said  _ You’re dead later _ , which made Jaehyun feel even more bewildered. Kun moved around Jaehyun to step out from behind the counter and said, “Jisung’s here somewhere too, you’ll get a chance to meet him in a minute, and everyone else will be around in the next few weeks. Now let’s show you around the place. Is it okay if I hold your elbow while I give you the tour of the kitchen?”

“That’d be great,” said Taeyong. “See you later, Jaehyun.”

“See you,” said Jaehyun, and watched Kun put a hand on the back of Taeyong’s arm to guide him to the door of the kitchen, talking brightly as he went. “…so everyone leaves their keys and bags there, though of course you should always be careful with valuables. You,  _ check your email _ ,” he said through gritted teeth over his shoulder as Jaehyun watched the two of them walk into the kitchen.

It didn’t hit him until he saw Taeyong reach out to feel along the doorframe as they passed through it.

He felt cold suddenly. How had he not realized? That was why Kun asked to take Taeyong’s elbow. And why Kun was pissed at him. Oh, god, Jaehyun was the dumbest idiot on this side of the Han River.

“ _ Jaehyun _ ,” said Ten, appearing out of nowhere at his side, and Jaehyun turned to him. Ten snapped his fingers in front of Jaehyun’s face.

“Jaehyun! Talk to me! Did it happen? Was it him? That guy? Jaehyun, you look like you’re about to barf fairy dust. Are you okay? Like are you good freaked or bad freaked?  _ Jaehyun? _ Can you  _ speak? _ ”

“I’m…I can…yeah.”

Ten asked, “Well? Did you get color or nott?”

“Yeah,” Jaehyun said.

Ten squealed, drawing a few stares from nearby customers. “It’s that guy, isn’t it? The guy Kun brought in? Is he a new worker here? What did he say?”

Jaehyun looked at his hands. He’d held Taeyong’s hand in his just a second ago. Taeyong had said his name.  _ Twice _ .

“He said nice to meet you,” Jaehyun said.

Ten blew out a puff of air. “ _ Nice to meet you? _ That’s  _ it? _ ”

“Ten,” Jaehyun said, looking back up, “he’s blind.”

Ten cocked his head and said, “Okay,” and then his face changed. “Oh…”

There was a brief silence.

“So he can’t…” Ten said.

“He doesn’t know,” said Jaehyun.

“Ooh,” Ten said, his face crinkling into a sympathetic grimace.

“I feel like,” said Jaehyun, gazing around at the café singing with color and light, “like I want to go…look at everything.”

“Look at what?”

“Everything…”

“Hoooly shit dude, you are out of it,” Ten said. Jaehyun didn’t answer. There was a girl studying at a nearby table with a ham sandwich in front of her, and how appalling, ham was  _ that _ color?

“So how would you rate color so far on a scale of one to me?” 

Jaehyun turned to see Ten filming him on his phone with a smirk. Jaehyun made a grab for it but Ten danced away.

“No, no,” said Ten. “Don’t be like that. Tell the people what it’s like to find your soulmate, spacey boy.”

“Don’t put that on…anywhere.”

Ten lowered the phone with a square smile. “I’m not putting it anywhere. Except maybe my Insta story. That’s all.”

“Don’t,” grumbled Jaehyun. He had turned his gaze to the macarons in the pastry case. There was a whole spectrum of colors in there. They were so vivid that they looked vaguely alarming. Was it healthy to eat food that… _ manic _ -looking? “Ten,” he said, pointing at one of the macarons, “that one’s blue.”

“No shit. It says blueberry on the label,” said Ten. He was recording Jaehyun with his phone again.

“Can you put that away?”

“Relax, I’m only going to send it to Johnny.”

“And I didn’t mean the flavor. I meant the color.”

“Duh. How do you know what blue is? I mean, how did you know my sweater is blue? Also, what color should I dye my hair, now that, like, you can see what would look good on me?”

Jaehyun said, “Your sweater’s the same color as the sky, so like, blue sky, blue. Well. You’re sweater’s a little…darker. But—”

“So do you think I could dye my hair blue?” Ten pulled up the fabric of his sweater at the shoulder and tilted his head into it.

“I—Ten, I don’t fucking know. Can I get back to you on that?” Jaehyun went behind the counter, ignoring Ten’s mutterings of “touchy, touchy,” and opened the pastry case. He glanced around the café to make sure no customers were watching and then withdrew a key lime macaron, which had gone from a thick custardy shade of gray to the same hyperactive color as the walls.

“Gimme one,” said Ten, leaning over the counter.

“It tastes the same,” said Jaehyun through a mouthful of macaron. “I don’t know why I thought it would taste different. It’s just such a weird fucking color, man.”

“Gimme one,” said Ten again.

“What are you doing back here?” said Jisung, emerging in his Cranberry Café apron from the door to the back office. Jaehyun dropped the sliding door to the pastry case and it slammed shut.

Jisung frowned at the half-eaten macaron in Jaehyun’s hand and said, “I thought your shift didn’t start for another hour.”

Jaehyun pointed at Jisung’s apron. “Jisung! Jisung Park! What’s the Cranberry Café color? What color are our aprons?”

“Huh?” Jisung gave him a weird look. “I can’t—”

“No, I know you don’t have color yet, but what color are our aprons supposed to be? Pink, right?”

Jisung snapped his fingers. “Yeah, yeah, pink. Pink’s the company color.”

Jaehyun turned to Ten and threw his hands into the air. “ _ Pink! _ ”

“Pink?” said Ten.

“The color of his hair!” Jaehyun pointed at Jisung’s apron. “The color of Taeyong’s hair! It’s  _ pink! _ ”

“Uh—Jaehyun, you’re kind of yelling,” said Jisung nervously.

“Oh my god. Taeyong.” Jaehyun turned to Jisung, who took a small step backwards, and said, “I have to tell him. Should I tell him now? Or not yet?”

“Taeyong? The new pastry chef?” said Jisung. He glanced at Ten and then back at Jaehyun. “I mean, I don’t think you have to tell him what color his hair is? Just because he’s blind doesn’t mean he doesn’t know what the—”

Jaehyun said, “No, no, no…” and Ten said, “Oh my god, he’s really blind.”

“Who are you?” said Jisung.

“I’m Ten,” said Ten.

“Wait…” said Jisung, pointing at Jaehyun, “how do you know what color Taeyong’s…”

Jisung’s eyes widened and his mouth rounded into an O just as Kun burst out of the kitchen, the door swinging shut behind him, and reached towards Jaehyun with both hands as if about to throttle him. “Jaehyun, what the hell? Have you not looked at your email once this week?”

“What? I—I didn’t realize,” Jaehyun said, “I mean, I knew I’d be training the new pastry chef in the front today, but I didn’t know that he’s blind…”

“I told everyone on  _ Monday _ ,” said Kun, throwing up his hands.

Jisung nodded, “Yeah, he emailed us on Monday.”

“Fuck. I must have missed it,” said Jaehyun, looking around for Ten, but Ten had disappeared. “I’m sorry—”

“You’re damn right, you’re sorry,” Kun said. “When he comes out of the bathroom, you’re going to actually  _ talk _ to him instead of standing there wondering why he’s not looking at you. I don’t want  _ anyone _ making Taeyong feel unwelcome or uncomfortable on his first goddamn day in this café. Understand?”

“Yes,” said Jaehyun, just as Jisung said, “Kun, Jaehyun’s got color.” 

Kun stopped and looked at Jaehyun with his mouth half-open.

Jaehyun nodded and said, “Yeah, I just got it a few minutes ago…”

Kun’s eyes had stopped glaring daggers into Jaehyun and were now dripping honey instead. “Jaehyun, that’s amazing. Who was it? Did you get a chance to talk to them?”

“Yeah, actually,” said Jaehyun with a halfhearted laugh, “it was Taeyong.”

Kun raised his eyebrows. Jisung said, “Whoooaaaa.”

“His hair’s pink,” said Jaehyun, “right?”

Kun smiled at Jaehyun as if that were the tenderest thing he’d ever heard. “Yeah. His hair’s pink.”

“What’s this called?” Jaehyun held up half the key-lime macaron.

Kun’s smile froze and then faded. “Green, and do you plan on paying for that?”

“But Johnny takes one every time he comes in and doesn’t pay and you don’t say anything,” said Jaehyun, following Kun to the other end of the counter where Kun had bent to shuffle through a pile of boxes and paper bags on the bottom shelf.

Kun pretended not to hear. “You’re not even on the clock, Jaehyun, you can’t get away with eating a six-thousand-won maracon for free.”

“Why do we even charge that much for those things?” said Jisung.

“Yeah, they’re like the size of my toenail,” said Jaehyun.

“Because they’re hard to make,” said Kun, standing up with a stack of pink cardboard boxes in his hands. “I had to pay Yoona good money so we could have good maracons, and now that she’s going to Paris, I have to pay Taeyong good money so we can have good macarons. And do you have any idea how much almond flour costs?”

“Maracons are made from almond flour?” said Jisung with a degree of astonishment.

“Customer, Jisung,” said Kun, nodding towards some girls who had just walked in the door, and shouldered his way back into the kitchen carrying the boxes. “I’m bringing Taeyong out in a second to show him the front, okay, Jaehyun?”

Kun stopped halfway through the kitchen door, looking at Jaehyun expectantly. Jaehyun stared back at him with wide eyes.

“If you’re going to keep hanging around back here before your shift, at least put on a pink apron,” said Kun, looking at him with half a smile before letting the kitchen door fall shut behind him.

Jaehyun barely had time to get himself together and walk out from behind the counter before Kun and Taeyong emerged from the kitchen again, Taeyong pulling on a pair of plastic gloves as they went. “So when they’re done, Jaehyun or Jisung or someone will come get them and put them here in the display case,” Kun was saying. “You probably won’t be out here behind the counter much, but feel free to touch the pastry case and get familiar with it.”

“Sure. Do you mind showing me where…?” Taeyong held up his hands.

“So here’s the handle,” said Kun, taking Taeyong’s wrist. “The door slides up. The macarons are the first two shelves on our right. Below them are the cakes and then the breads, the pretzels, the croissants, all that is on the left.”

“Ah,” said Taeyong, gripping the handle of the door to the pastry case and pushing it up.

“Hey Taeyong,” Jaehyun said suddenly. He coughed. He had meant to interject himself into the conversation a little less awkwardly.

Taeyong turned to him with a smile that was pure bliss. “Hi, Jaehyun.”

“Hi,” said Jaehyun again, then put his head in his hands. Jisung, who had just finished giving the girls their change, turned away to stifle a laugh.

“I thought your shift didn’t start for a while,” said Taeyong, hands patting lightly over the rows of macarons in the case.

Jaehyun, who was still thinking about the fact that Taeyong had recognized his voice from the six words he’d spoken to him earlier, nodded and said, “Oh, yeah, uh, I just wanted to…hang out up here…with you…guys. For a minute.”

Taeyong’s smile quirked. He withdrew his hand from the pastry case and gently slid it shut. Kun and Jisung were eyeing Jaehyun with barely suppressed smirks.

“Well,” Kun said into the silence, “Jaehyun will give you a more thorough tour of the front area when you train with him later. For now, I’d just like you to start getting familiar with the locations of the pastry case and the cash register. When you’re standing behind the pastries, the cash register will be directly on your left.”

“Right,” said Taeyong, reaching a gloved hand in the direction of the register. Instead he brushed Jisung’s hand and they both laughed.

“Oops! Is that…” Taeyong said.

“Sorry. That’s me. Jisung.” Jisung nudged Taeyong’s hand to the cash register and Taeyong nodded. “Thanks.”

“So if you turn straight back from the cash register,” said Kun, “there’s the door to the back office. It’s different from the kitchen door, it’s actually got a handle on the left. Jaehyun will show you that later.”

“Okay,” said Taeyong, who was pulling off the plastic gloves.

“All right, let’s head back to the kitchen,” said Kun, and before Jaehyun knew it, they were gone. He briefly considered following them into the kitchen, but then Ten was next to him again, whisper-screaming in his ear.

“DID YOU TELL HIM? JAEHYUN, DID YOU TELL—”

Jaehyun shoved Ten’s face away and said, “Jisung knows, you don’t have to yell in my ear.”

“Can you guys, like, move? That guy is trying to order,” said Jisung, nodding around Jaehyun and Ten. Jaehyun jumped, and they bowed to the man standing behind them before scurrying back to their table near the windows.

“So?” Ten said before they had even sat down. “Did you tell him?”

Jaehyun slid into his seat and stared down at the blue-and-green cover of his book. “Ten. He’s so fucking beautiful.”

“No kidding. You two are going to be the most good-looking couple on the peninsula. Did you tell him or not?”

“No,” said Jaehyun.

“ _ Whaaaat? _ ”

“He’s so…so pretty,” said Jaehyun, “I get all tongue-tied and stuff.”

“You’re a mess today,” said Ten, leaning back in his chair and chewing on the end of his pen.

“What,” said Jaehyun defensively, “did you want me to just blurt out that we’re soulmates in front of Kun and Jisung? That would be weird.”

“It wouldn’t be that weird,” said Ten.

“I think I want to like,” said Jaehyun, “wait to tell him, maybe.”

“Wait?  _ Wait? _ ” said Ten. 

“Not for that long! Just…maybe…I’m a total stranger, the only thing he knows about me is what my voice sounds like,” said Jaehyun. He turned his book over. There was pink on the back. Pink and blue looked nice together. “Maybe I should try to hang out with him before I spring it on him. Just so it’s not, like, out of nowhere.”

“If I were him I’d want to know as soon as possible,” shrugged Ten, tossing his pen onto the table and pulling out his phone. “I’m just saying. It’s kind of unfair that you knew right away and he still doesn’t.”

Jaehyun’s heart sank. Was he lying to Taeyong by omission right now? Was that what he was doing?

“Johnny says to answer your phone,” added Ten, holding up his phone.

Jaehyun dug his phone out of his pocket. He ignored the dozens of message notifications from various apps and went straight to his missed calls from Johnny.

“Dude, holy shit! Congratulations!” Johnny was so loud that the line crackled a little.

“Johnny, I feel like I’m about to lose my mind,” said Jaehyun.

“It’s okay, it’s okay. It’s normal to feel overwhelmed and everything. Especially in the first 24 hours. Remember when I met Kun and got dizzy and pretty much fell on him and he had to catch me? It’s okay, whatever weird stuff is going on in your head, it’s happening to your soulmate too. Color is discombobulating for everybody.”

“Put him on speaker. Put him on speaker,” demanded Ten, who seemed to be able to hear what Johnny was saying even across the table. Jaehyun, leaning his forehead into his hand, put the phone down on the table and turned on speakerphone, making sure the volume was low.

“—an app, it’s called Color Me, it helps you and your soulmate get through your first week of color vision without freaking out. You hook it up to your soulmate’s account and it—”

“Shut up.  _ Johnny! _ Shut up, Jaehyun’s soulmate is  _ blind _ ,” Ten said into the phone.

“Shhh,” said Jaehyun, looking behind him.

“What?” said Johnny.

“Jaehyun’s soulmate doesn’t know he’s Jaehyun’s soulmate yet, stupidass,” Ten hissed.

“He can’t see?” Johnny said.

“Yeah,” said Ten.

“Oh, fuck,” said Johnny.

Jaehyun whispered, “Johnny, what do I do? Do I tell him now? Or like, after work? Or do I try to get a date first and then—”

“Okay, well, definitely don’t wait until you get a date,” said Johnny. “What if he’s the type who doesn’t date till he finds his soulmate? Then you screw yourself.”

“So I should tell him  _ now? _ ” Jaehyun said, his voice squeaking.

“Fuck. Let me think,” said Johnny.

Ten leaned forward. “The answer is, yes, you should tell him now. I’m not saying you bust into the kitchen right this second and be like, ‘TAEYONG, YOU AND I ARE FATED,’ no, that would scare him. I’m saying you ask Kun to take him aside and ask if you can talk to him.”

“Is he hot?” said Johnny.

“Johnny, how is that helpful?” said Jaehyun.

“Shut up Jaehyun. He’s drop dead fucking gorgeous,” said Ten into the phone.

“Yoooo, for real?”

“If I were Jaehyun, I think I’d be crying right now,” said Ten.

“ _ What? _ You just called me a mess because I said he was pretty!”

“Did I say I wouldn’t be a mess too? No.”

“Okay, no, listen,” said Johnny’s tinny voice over the speaker. “If he didn’t get color when he saw you, then we don’t know if he’s feeling any soulmatey feels yet at all. Destinologists think that color is withheld till you see your soulmate in order to jumpstart the soulmate bond, right? Your subconscious attributes all the happiness, and, like, awe and wonder you feel at the first sight of color to the appearance of your soulmate, and you love them before you even know them. But without color you wouldn’t even care about them. At least not until you’ve spent more time with them.”

Ten groaned. “Johnny, can you not tell Jaehyun his soulmate doesn’t care about him? Destinology is literally hack science.”

“It’s not hack, it’s a  _ spiritual science _ ,” said Johnny woundedly, “and I’m not saying Jaehyun’s soulmate doesn’t care about him, I’m just saying he might not be all lovestruck right now like Jaehyun is. So, like, don’t go into this with guns blazing, is all. We don’t want to spook the guy.”

“Johnny’s right.” Jaehyun had put his head down on the table. His voice sounded muffled but didn’t care. “He doesn’t have any reason to like me. I’m just some random guy to him.”

“No, no, Jaehyun, that’s not—”

“WAY TO GO JOHNNY, YOU MESSED HIM UP,” said Ten, reaching over the phone to grasp Jaehyun’s shoulders in his hands and shake them. Jaehyun made a noise in his throat. Ten hit him on the head and said, “Get it together, man! If you’re a random guy, then change that! Tell him why you shouldn’t be random anymore!”

“Yeah, no, Jae, he’s your  _ soulmate _ , of course he’s going to like you. That’s what soulmates do,” said Johnny. “They like each other.”

Jaehyun raised his head and said, “Oh yeah. That’s true.”

“Be confident! Be yourself! Go tell him!” said Ten.

“Be gay! Do crimes!” said Johnny.

“Yeah,” said Jaehyun, rising out of his chair. “Yeah!”

Ten cheered and Johnny said, “Woohoo!”

“Wait,” said Jaehyun, sinking back into his chair.

“UGH,” said Ten.

“I—I’m going to tell him. I’m  _ going _ to tell him,” said Jaehyun. “Just not right now.”

“WHY?” cried Ten, holding his palms out beseechingly.

“I’m going to tell him when his shift ends,” said Jaehyun, “okay? After he’s had the chance to get used to me a little bit. I feel weird bringing it up all of a sudden.”

Johnny said, “No, no, I think Jaehyun’s got the right idea. Like, don’t let him leave today without telling him, but—”

“Hey Jaehyun,” said Kun. Ten and Jaehyun looked up from the phone. Kun was weaving between tables, untying his apron as he went. He nodded to Ten as he stopped in front of their table. “Hey, Ten.”

“Hi Kunnie,” said Ten, waving his fingers daintily.

“Kun? Is Kun there?” said Johnny’s voice.

Kun blinked disorientedly a few times and then his eyes settled on Jaehyun’s phone. “Oh. Hi baby, it’s me.”

“Did you meet Jaehyun’s soulmate? What’s he like?”

“Yes. He’s very nice. And he looks like an anime character,” said Kun.

“His eyes are the size of small stars,” said Ten.

“Medium-small stars, maybe,” said Kun. “Like our sun.”

“Guys, he could walk out here any minute,” muttered Jaehyun.

“Where is he anyway?” said Ten.

“I told him to take an early break in the office,” said Kun. “Johnny, can I talk to my employee real quick? His shift is starting soon.”

“To Jaehyun? Sure. When are you coming home?”

“Ten minutes.”

“Okay. Love you. Jaehyun, good luck, you’ll be fine. Don’t think too hard, just do it, okay?”

“Yeah,” said Jaehyun.

“Hanging uuup,” sang Kun sweetly, and hit the end button. “Jaehyun, did you read the email? You’re going to train Taeyong the same way you trained Jungwoo when he started. Just give him an overview of the front and let him listen to you take some orders.” Kun took off his apron and began to fold it up. “I’m not concerned with having him memorize the layout of everything out here. Just make sure he’s comfortable with the area.”

“Am I going to be on register while I’m training him?” said Jaehyun.

“Only for the lull. Jaemin comes in at 4:45 and Taeyong’s done for the day at 5.”

“Oh, okay,” said Jaehyun.

Kun tied his folded apron neatly and hugged it to his stomach. “Do you plan on talking to him today about getting color?”

“Uh…I think so,” said Jaehyun, looking at Ten, who beamed encouragingly.

“That’s great,” said Kun with a misty-eyed smile. “I’m really happy for you, Jaehyun.”

“I know. Thanks, Kun,” said Jaehyun.

“Good luck,” said Kun, giving a thumbs-up before skipping back in the direction of the register and saying, “I’ll wait till you’re clocked in to leave Taeyong with you. You’ve got ten minutes.”

Jaehyun looked at Ten, his knee jittering under the table.

“You look antsy,” said Ten.

“I feel like I might as well clock in now,” said Jaehyun. “I mean, otherwise I’m just sitting here doing nothing, right? I should just clock in now. That way I can take over training Taeyong, and Kun can go home. No point in making Kun wait around another ten minutes.”

“Uh huh. Your motivation for clocking in early definitely has nothing to do with wanting to hang out with your soulmate and everything to do with letting Kun get home to Johnny faster,” said Ten, looking up at him as Jaehyun packed up his things and put them in his backpack.

“What can I say,” said Jaehyun, “I’m a great employee and a great friend.” He slung his backpack over his shoulder.

“Go get him!” said Ten and made a punching motion in the air with his fists. Jaehyun frowned at him. Ten raised his hands over his head and danced in his seat as Jaehyun walked to the front, passing Jisung who gave him an eyebrow wiggle on his way out.

Jaehyun passed behind Kun, who was taking an order at the register, and pushed open the door to the back office. It was a cramped room with a depressingly tiny window, but color found it somehow charming, the ratty couch along the wall suddenly looking quaint in its new shade of pale green as Taeyong, sitting on the end with his legs crossed, raised his head and said, “Hello?”

“Hey, Taeyong,” he said, knowing his voice was dripping tenderness and unable to hold it back, “it’s Jaehyun.”

Taeyong smiled that smile and removed a single airpod that Jaehyun hadn’t noticed from his ear. “Hi, Jaehyun. Is it time to start training?”

“No,” said Jaehyun, “no. We have ten minutes still.” He closed the door behind him and sat down at the table which was too big for the small room. “Were you listening to music?”

“Oh—yeah, but it’s no problem, I was done,” said Taeyong, shifting to face Jaehyun.

“Oh, what were you listening to?” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong’s smile turned a little sheepish and he said, “Post Malone?”

“‘ _ Sunflower’ _ ?” said Jaehyun eagerly.

Taeyong nodded quickly, his face lighting up. “I—no, ‘ _ Psycho _ ,’ but I love ‘ _ Sunflower’ _ —”

“Oh, ‘ _ Psycho _ ’ is really good,” Jaehyun said.

“Yeah,” said Taeyong, “they’re both really good.”

Jaehyun laughed in agreement. “I think the first time I heard ‘ _ Sunflower _ ,’ I didn’t listen to anything else for like 36 hours,” Taeyong went on.

“The start of Post’s verse,” said Jaehyun. “That’s the part.”

“Yes! ‘ _ Every time I’m leavin’ on ya _ ,’” said Taeyong.

“That’s the part!” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong leaned back against the couch with a satisfied grin. “Gorgeous production,” he sighed. “So simple and balanced.”

Jaehyun stole another long glance at Taeyong. He really did look like something out of an art museum. He could have been a statue of an angel, except that he was walking and breathing. It occurred to Jaehyun that he didn’t exactly have to  _ hide _ his staring, because either way, Taeyong wouldn’t see him. The thought made him feel weird and he looked back down at his hands. “Do you listen to a lot of music?”

“Uh huh,” said Taeyong, “it’s like one of my favorite things. That and baking. Do you like music?”

“Yeah, I’m actually studying music theory and composition at university,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong sat up. “Ooh. Really? Do you like it?”

“Yeah,” said Jaehyun, struggling to keep up with the conversation when he felt like he was falling in love at a million miles an hour. It seemed that Taeyong was a magnet and every little word he spoke was turning Jaehyun into scrap metal. “I uh, I can’t imagine having done anything else.”

“You’re in university,” said Taeyong, leaning forward curiously. “What year?”

“Last one. I’m 23,” Jaehyun said.

Taeyong’s lips parted and he nodded slowly. Jaehyun said, a spark of nervousness blooming in him, “What about you?”

“25,” said Taeyong.

“Ah,” said Jaehyun, somehow a little surprised. In spite of himself, he’d half expected Taeyong to say he was ageless or something. Twenty-five. It was such a normal number. So human.

The door opened and Kun poked his head in. “Hi. It’s Kun. I’m heading out.”

“Okay. Thanks for training today,” said Taeyong.

“Of course. Jaehyun, you all set to finish Taeyong’s training?” said Kun, turning to him with a toothy smile.

Jaehyun nodded quickly and said, “Yep, no problem, you can go,” and Kun gave him a knowing look and said, “Great. See you guys later.”

Jaehyun put on his apron and they went to the front, taking Taeyong through all the contents of the shelves and cabinets behind the counter. Taeyong took it all in quickly, the coffee presses and the hot chocolate machine, the tins and bottles, boxes and bags. He said it was easier to navigate out here than in the kitchen because there were no tables or standalone shelves, just a single long straight space. Eventually when they’d gone over everything, Jaehyun leaned against the back counter and said, “So…what do you think so far?”

“Of the café?” said Taeyong. His hands felt along the counter and found some red coffee stirrers. He lifted one out.

“Yeah,” said Jaehyun, “of the café and…”  _ …of me? _ “Of everything?”

Taeyong fiddled with the coffee stirrer in his hand. “I like it. It’s a lot bigger than the last place I worked at, so it’ll take some getting used to. But the kitchen’s a dream. And I like you guys a lot.”

Jaehyun’s heart jumped. “You do?”

“Yeah, I do,” said Taeyong. “You’re very cute. And Jisung seems like a good kid. And Kun, god, he’s the sweetest. Did you know he labeled all the dry ingredients at the baking station in Braille? At my old job I just had to memorize where everything was, which was fine, but, yeah. That was really thoughtful of Kun.”

The words  _ very cute _ echoed in Jaehyun’s head. What did Taeyong think was cute about him? He tried to think of something cute he had done today. He couldn’t. “Yeah,” he said, “Kun is amazing.”

“You seem close,” said Taeyong, twisting the red plastic coffee stirrer so it bent and went pink at the fold.

Jaehyun blinked at the pink line on the coffee stirrer and then picked one up himself to experiment. “Me and Kun?” he said. “How did you know?”

Taeyong shrugged. “Just from the way he talks to you. Informally, and like, affectionately.”

Jaehyun laughed. “Oh. True. Yeah, one of my best friends is Kun’s soulmate. They’ve been together for a couple years.”

“Do you like working for him?” Taeyong asked.

“Oh, yeah,” said Jaehyun. “He’s cool. Like, he definitely has a scary boss mode, but mostly he’s just nice boss mode. He—oh…”

Taeyong, who had heard the entry bell too, said, “Customer?”

Jaehyun tossed the coffee stirrer into the trash can under the counter. “Yeah. One sec.”

Not long afterwards, Jaemin came in. After introducing them, Jaehyun realized with a wave of apprehension that his time with Taeyong was almost up. They did one more round of the kitchen so that Taeyong could refresh his memory and then clocked him out. In the office as Taeyong removed his apron and placed it neatly in the bin, Jaehyun asked him, “Do you have any other questions that you can think of?”

“I do have one,” said Taeyong. “Would you mind giving me your number? You’re really sweet and I’d appreciate it a lot if I could contact you if I needed something.”

_ Really sweet _ . Really sweet! Taeyong thought he was very cute and really sweet. “No, of course,” Jaehyun said, “you can message anytime at all.”

“You can say the digits and my phone will plug it in,” said Taeyong, holding the phone out to Jaehyun, who said his number into the speaker. Taeyong asked if his phone had transcribed the number right, and Jaehyun said that it had. Taeyong thanked him and said, “Great. Am I set to go?”

“Oh actually,” said Jaehyun, throat tightening in sudden trepidation and excitement. “Do you—can I talk to you for a second? There’s something I need to tell you. Not about work, I mean.”

“Hm?” Taeyong turned his face up from his phone. “What’s that?”

Jaehyun bit his lip. Why hadn’t he thought about what he was going to say ahead of time? Suddenly he was lost for words. “So there’s…I wanted to tell you…When you walked into the café today, uh…”

Taeyong cocked his head slightly. His pretty eyes were aimed at Jaehyun’s chin. His smile was soft.

Jaehyun took a breath. “When I looked at you, I saw color for the first time.”

The smile seemed to drift from Taeyong’s face like a ship pulling up anchor—slowly at first, and gone a blink later. He turned his face downward. “Oh,” he said, shuffling in his bag aimlessly.

Jaehyun cleared his throat. “Uh…is that…is it okay…?”

“What?” Taeyong abandoned his search in his bag and gripped the strap on his shoulder. “No, it’s just that—” There was a look on his face that made Jaehyun’s chest feel hollow. He gave a humorless laugh and then said in a low voice, as if he were admitting something shameful, “You’re not the first person to tell me that.”

For a second Jaehyun couldn’t say anything. Taeyong ran his hand up and down his shoulder strap, adjusted it, and readjusted it.

“Someone lied to you?” Jaehyun whispered.

Taeyong nodded. Then he said, “Yeah. I—sorry, I have to go. I think my ride’s here. Thank you so much for, like, the training and everything. It was great to meet you and—talk to you and everything.”

“No, yeah, of course,” said Jaehyun. “I had a great time. I mean, it was great.”

“I’m sure we’ll have another shift together soon,” said Taeyong, his hand finding the door handle. He twisted it and pushed through the door, bumping into Jaemin, who jumped and said, “Sorry!”

“Can I help…?” said Jaehyun, stopping in the doorway of the office.

“No, no, sorry. I’ve got it. Sorry, Jaemin.” Taeyong put a hand on the counter, removed it, and walked to the end of the counter without hesitation. Jaehyun watched as he turned out from behind the counter and let the back of his hand brush against the line of tables to the front door, which he pushed open, prompting the bell to jingle. And then he disappeared.

Jaehyun stood with his hands hanging at his sides and felt a sudden, somehow delayed, drop in his stomach. Taeyong had been lied to. Taeyong had walked away. For two hours he had been here, and now Jaehyun was alone again.

Jaehyun ignored Jaemin’s sideways glance and went to the window in time to see Taeyong, standing on the sidewalk with his phone to his ear, get inside a car and pull away. The car’s rear lights were redder than he knew red could be. As they faded amid the traffic and vanished, the colors around him seemed to wilt.


	2. Smell

Jaehyun walked around in simultaneous wonder and misery for the next week. Johnny did his best to coach him through the first few days of color, taking him to the beach one day, the next day to the movies, another day to the art museum with Kun and Ten, who eventually got tired of hearing about colors he couldn’t see and redirected everyone to a place with food. Jaehyun knew his friends were taking him to do these things because they were the kinds of things soulmates did together during their first few weeks. They were baffled by what had happened at the café. They didn’t know anyone else who hadn’t immediately gotten together with their soulmate after meeting them. It happened, of course. But rarely. His friends, at a loss as he was, did their best to make the best of a situation none of them understood.

Still, his mind was on Taeyong every second of every day. The color of the sea reminded him of Taeyong. The painting at the art museum of the two figures sitting back to back with their hands clasped reminded him of Taeyong. He was surprised at how much he missed him—not just missing his face or the feelings he had when he saw him, but missing his presence, missing his words. Jaehyun’s mind seemed to snag on the thought of Taeyong like seaweed on a lost fishhook. Where was he right now? What was he doing? What was he feeling? And what, what kind of sick asshole would lie to a blind person about being their soulmate? What kind of sick asshole would lie to  _ Lee Taeyong? _ About  _ anything? _

They searched online for what Jaehyun should do, but it didn’t turn up anything helpful. The internet at large, in fact, had little to say about blind soulmates. There was plenty of stuff about dead soulmates, and soulmates that challenge what you think you know about your sexuality, and soulmates with age differences, and soulmates that don’t speak the same language. But the internet didn’t offer much about blind soulmates, and even less about blind soulmates who had been lied to and gotten their hearts broken. And Jaehyun didn’t know what to do.

He still didn’t know what do when, six days after first meeting Taeyong, he walked into the kitchen at the beginning of a busy Saturday shift to find out if the chocolate croissants were baked yet and found Taeyong training with Jungwoo at the back. The sight of Taeyong’s face, his pink hair, the smudge of powder on his cheek, made the world grind to a halt for a split second before it accelerated into forward motion again.

Jaehyun diverted his steps from the croissants, failing to notice Taeil asking him a question about the supply of baguette sandwiches left in the case outside, and ended up standing in front of the table where Jungwoo, the assistant pastry chef Yoona had brought with her five years ago who was now a permanent fixture of the café, was showing Taeyong how to use the food processor—or rather, it proved upon closer inspection, where Taeyong was showing Jungwoo how to use the food processor.

“Some people tell me it’s a waste of time, but I’ve always liked how it aerates my dry ingredients more than if I mix them up in a bowl,” Taeyong was saying, fingers grazing over the buttons.

“And you don’t have to worry as much about deflating the egg and cream of tartar when you fold them in,” said Jungwoo, whose warm features were bright with interest.

“Exactly. Little hack.”

“Hey,” said Jaehyun as casually as he could, “what’s up, Taeyong?”

“Jaehyun,” said Taeyong, with some surprise, turning towards the sound of his voice. Jaehyun couldn’t tell if it was good surprise or bad surprise.

“Good morning to you too, Mister Jung,” said Jungwoo.

“Hi Woo,” said Jaehyun. “What are you guys making?”

“Angel food cake,” said Taeyong, and pressed a button on the food processor. It roared and Taeyong’s mouth rounded. Quickly he shuffled to push the button again. The rumbling subsided.

Taeyong turned his head apologetically and said, “I forget how loud these things are sometimes.”

“Yeah,” said Jaehyun.

“Jaehyun?” Jaemin’s voice called from the front of the kitchen. Jaehyun turned around to see Jaemin looking for him frantically. When Jaemin’s eyes found him on the opposite side of the kitchen from the cooling racks, he frowned and said, “Hello? Chocolate croissants? I have two people out here waiting on—”

“Yeah, sorry. Sorry! I’m coming,” said Jaehyun. He turned back to a bemused-looking Taeyong and a smirking Jungwoo, saying, “I’ll—see you later?”

“Okay,” said Taeyong.

Four hours later, Jaehyun still hadn’t had the chance to talk to Taeyong again. It occurred to him as he was ringing up orders at the cash register that he had never missed a person this much in his life. The weirdest part was, the person he missed was less than ten meters away. He wondered how long this would go on. If it could go on forever. Then as he was making a latte Jaemin passed behind him carrying a tray of cake pops and said, “Taeyong just left,” and Jaehyun let out a dismayed noise.

“He said to say goodbye to you,” said Jaemin, not hearing or else ignoring Jaehyun’s involuntary cry of disappointment and pulling up the door to the pastry case.

“He…to me?” Jaehyun said.

“Yeah. He was leaving and he told me goodbye, and he heard you at the cash register talking to a customer and he said ‘Say goodbye to Jaehyun for me.’”

Jaehyun’s heart swelled like a balloon. “Did he say anything else?”

Jaemin, having unloaded the cake pops safely into the case, put the tray under his arm and gave Jaehyun a weird look. “No. Just so you know, we’re out of tomato soup.”

Five days later, just after the sun rose, Jaehyun was on a run at the park. He didn’t usually go on runs, but the cherry blossoms were just beginning to open, and it was the first time he’d seen them,  _ really _ seen them, and he couldn’t stay inside for long with all this frothing spring color bursting in the streets. He was jogging down a path under the bowing, silent blooms when he saw a figure sitting with their legs crossed on the bench up ahead. It took him several seconds to distinguish the figure’s pink hair from the cherry blossoms behind his head.

He slowed. Taeyong’s arms were outstretched along the back of the bench and the early sunlight was buttery on his skin. He had earphones in. One foot was tapping on the ground.

Jaehyun stopped next to Taeyong, hesitated, started to walk away, and then turned around and walked back. “Hey, good morning, Taeyong,” he said, softly enough that Taeyong wouldn’t hear unless his music was low.

Taeyong took an earphone out and said, “Sorry—hello?”

“Hi, uh, it’s me, Jaehyun.”

“Oh! Jaehyun. Hi.” Taeyong brought his arms in closer to his body, bundling up his earphones.

Jaehyun cleared his throat. Taeyong seemed nervous. He should exchange a few pleasantries and then leave him alone. “It’s really nice to see you. Like, outside of work and everything.”

Taeyong laughed. “Yeah. I love the café, but it gets old sometimes.”

“Haha. Right.” Jaehyun shuffled his feet a little. “How’s training going so far?”

“Just finished yesterday,” said Taeyong. He wound and unwound his bundled-up earphones as he spoke. “My first real work shift starts this afternoon, so…yeah.”

“Oh, that’s awesome,” said Jaehyun. “You’re going to kill it.”

Taeyong looked shy. “Thanks. I hope so too.”

A beat of silence. Jaehyun looked around at the brightening morning. “Anyway, I’m sorry I bothered you. I was just really happy to see you.”

Taeyong gave a little laugh. Jaehyun could feel himself reddening. “I’ll head out now and let you get back to your chill time. Good luck at work today,” he finished, and turned on his heel.

“Wait, wait,” said Taeyong. Jaehyun turned back around faster than a spinning top. “You don’t have to go,” said Taeyong, “just yet. I’d like to have some company.”

“Oh,” said Jaehyun, trying to keep his voice steady. “Sure, that would be really nice.”

Taeyong scooted a little bit to the side of the bench and said, “You can sit down, if you want.”

“Thanks.” Jaehyun sat down next to him. They were close enough to touch.

“We’re pretty far from the café,” said Taeyong. “Do you live around here?”

“Yeah. Right on the other side of the stream,” said Jaehyun.

“That sounds pretty.”

“What about you?”

Taeyong shook his head. “I live up closer to Jamsil. My roommate goes to a tumbling gym near here a few times a week. Once in a while I come with him and he drops me off here while he goes to the gym.”

“Ah,” said Jaehyun, “so that’s why you’re here so early.”

“Yeah, pretty much. I only come up on days when I can manage to get myself out of bed.” He shrugged and said, “But it’s great to have some time alone. Like, to have some free time. I love my roommates, I mean, my best friend and my brother, they’re the most amazing people in the world. But it’s nice to…”

“Have a break,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong nodded. “Right.”

“I totally get that.”

“What are you doing out here at seven AM?” Taeyong drew up one leg and let it form a triangle with his other leg so he could sit facing Jaehyun. “Are you just a morning person?”

Jaehyun snorted. “No. I wish I was. Today I just really wanted to go on a run before class to see the cherry blossoms.”

“The cherry blossoms?” said Taeyong.

“Yeah, they’re incredible, they look like a fairytale. I had no idea how…” Jaehyun froze. Shit. “Um. I’m sorry.”

Taeyong let out a soft laugh. “Sorry for what?”

Jaehyun watched Taeyong’s fingers toy with his earphones.

“You’re allowed to talk about what things look like,” said Taeyong. “I don’t mind.”

“Oh,” muttered Jaehyun, feeling silly, “sorry.”

“You had no idea how what?” Taeyong asked.

A pink petal had fallen onto the slope of Taeyong’s shoulder. It clung to the fabric of his jacket. For some reason it put Jaehyun in mind of a little baby animal clinging to its mother. “How much more beautiful they are in color,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong’s hands stilled. They sat next to each other in silence. Jaehyun didn’t know what to say so he just said, “I met you just in time to see them.”

Taeyong let out a small, shuddering sigh. Jaehyun stood up. “I should go.”

Taeyong raised his face with a weary smile and said, “How many times do I have to tell you that you don’t have to go?” and patted the bench beside him.

Jaehyun stood dumbly for a second. Taeyong reached out, found Jaehyun’s sleeve, and tugged on it.

Jaehyun sat back down. “Sorry,” he said.

“You apologize a lot,” said Taeyong.

“I do?” Jaehyun laughed. “Uh. Yeah.”

“You were about to do it again just now.” Taeyong’s smile was a real one now.

“How’d you know?”

“You paused for a second after you said, ‘I do?’ but then you caught yourself.”

“You got me.” The pink light peering through the cherry blossom petals was brightening as the sun rose.

“You were talking about the cherry blossoms,” said Taeyong.

A beat passed and Jaehyun said, “Uh, yeah. They’re pink. I guess everyone knows that, but. Yeah. They’re the same color as your hair.” Taeyong nodded, a small frown creasing his forehead. Jaehyun said, “They make everything kind of glow.”

“Glow,” said Taeyong.

“Mm-hm,” said Jaehyun. “Before, they were just soft and gray and fluffy. Now they look sort of…magical.”

Taeyong nodded, giving a smile that looked pasted on. “They sound amazing.”

Jaehyun wanted to say more, but Taeyong seemed preoccupied. Jaehyun bit the words back.

“What you said,” said Taeyong into the silence, “about—getting color. It’s…not that I don’t believe you.”

Taeyong’s fingers followed the lines of chipped paint on the park bench. They were slim, almost bony.

“It’s that I just had a really, like, messy breakup and uh…” Taeyong let his hands fall into his lap and gave an empty laugh. “Well, I guess I don’t really know how to believe anyone right now.”

Jaehyun felt crumbly. He wished he could wrap his arms around Taeyong and squeeze tight enough to keep himself from falling apart. “You said someone lied to you that they were your soulmate?”

Taeyong puffed his cheeks out and exhaled. “He told me he got color when he met me. That was three years ago. Then he found his real soulmate and…” A tremor ran through his voice. He cleared his throat. “Yeah, that was the end of that.”

“That’s,” said Jaehyun, “horrible.”

Taeyong nodded.

A bird sang somewhere into the pink and blue morning. Jaehyun realized he was shivering. He’d only worn a long-sleeved T-shirt on the run, and the early spring dawn was still chilly.

“I know you don’t really know me,” he said in a low voice, “and you have no reason to trust me, but I’ll never lie to you.”

Taeyong looked as if he were going to say something, but he didn’t. The single pink petal still sat on his shoulder. It looked less like a baby animal now and more like a tiny fairy or sprite embracing its fairy king.

Several seconds had passed before Taeyong said, “Thanks.”

Jaehyun said, “Yeah. Of course.”

Taeyong wiped at his nose. “I think my roommate is probably finishing up by now,” he said, holding up his phone.

“Oh,” said Jaehyun, “yeah.”

Taeyong nodded but made no move to open his phone. Jaehyun said, “I should probably get going and uh…get ready for class.”

Some part of Jaehyun was hoping that Taeyong would shake his head at him and say,  _ “Already?”  _ or _ “Remember when I said you don’t have to leave yet?”  _ or _ “No. Stay.” _ But Taeyong only nodded and said, “Okay. See you soon.”

After the day at the park, Jaehyun started to cross his fingers everywhere he went in the hopes that he would run into Taeyong, but his good luck seemed to have burned out hot and fast. The only chances Jaehyun got to speak with Taeyong were at work, and even when he got lucky enough to have a shift with Taeyong, he only managed to speak with him in passing. 

“Just give him every shift with Taeyong you can,” said Ten when Kun and Johnny came over one night.

Jaehyun looked at Kun hopefully, but Kun was scoffing. “I can’t do that. That would be weird. I can’t get involved with my employees’ soulmate issues.”

“Off the record then,” said Ten. “Say you’re not going to do it, but then, like, do it.”

“I hope you never hold a position of power over other people, because you will abuse it,” said Kun, slurping his japchae.

Ten smiled sweetly and said, “I already have more power over other people than I know what to do with,” and dabbed with a napkin at Kun’s chin. Kun backhanded him in the throat and he made a choking noise.

Johnny kicked a socked foot up on Jaehyun and Ten’s coffee table. Jaehyun grabbed Ten’s honeysuckle candle burning on the table and moved it away from Johnny’s foot as Johnny said, “Hey Ten, you’re the last one. You’re the only one of us who hasn’t gotten color yet.”

Ten let his backbone and limbs go slack and fell back against the couch. “Don’t gloat. You’re a meanie.”

“It’s just facts,” said Kun. “Johnny, your foot smells.”

“You like it,” said Johnny, wiggling his foot under Kun’s nose.

“Your time will come, little sprout,” Jaehyun told a sourfaced Ten, and tossed a leg over Ten’s knees to yank him closer for a hug. Ten, still limp as a ragdoll, slumped sideways over Jaehyun’s elbow. “Ten, sit up,” said Jaehyun, trying to shift him into his arms. Ten flopped uselessly onto Jaehyun’s lap.

“Do you want me to expose your foot kink?” Johnny said to Kun, who was protesting Johnny’s foot in his face. Kun said, “What? I don’t h—”

Ten shrieked. “FOOT KINK?”

“Oops! Too late. Looks like I exposed it,” said Johnny.

“Ew, Kun, you have a foot kink?” said Jaehyun. Kun vaulted over the coffee table to tackle Johnny.

Three days later Kun emailed the work calendar for the second half of April and Jaehyun found that every time Taeyong was scheduled during the next two weeks, Jaehyun was scheduled too. “ _ THANK YOU _ ,” Jaehyun messaged Kun.

“ _ for what _ ” Kun replied.

Jaehyun hadn’t been able to stop thinking about how awful it must have been for Taeyong to find out that the person he thought was his soulmate had been lying to him. It had been doing circles in his head—why would someone do that? How hardhearted, how warped did you have to be? Worse was the fact that the guy who lied to Taeyong had gotten his happy ending, he was out there living happily with his real soulmate even now. There was only one explanation. Fate was cruel.

Jaehyun thought that if he’d been lied to like that, he wouldn’t want another man to even speak to him ever again. He couldn’t blame Taeyong for hesitating to take him at his word. In fact, in some ways, it seemed best if Jaehyun just let Taeyong be until he was ready to trust him. But how could Taeyong ever trust him without getting to know him better? They were barely friends—acquaintances at best. Some days it seemed like they were little more than strangers, nothing linking them, nothing connecting them, only Jaehyun’s fixed one-sided yearning to know Taeyong more.

Other days, though, it felt like Taeyong knew him without trying. The third Thursday of April was a busy one, and the café’s early-evening rush didn’t slow until around 7. Once things died down in the front, Taeil told Yangyang, Xiaojun and Jisung they could go home, leaving only Jaehyun to man the register and Taeyong to finish the macarons for Friday.

Yangyang, having locked his pink apron in his locker in the office, told Jaehyun on his way out, “Hope you have some nice alone time with your crush.”

Jisung snickered. Jaehyun said, “What—crush? What do you—”

Yangyang made doe-eyes and blubbed as he walked backwards, “ _ Hi, Taeyong! How are you, Taeyong? You’re so pretty, Taeyong! Let me have your babies, Taeyong! _ ”

Jaehyun looked towards the closed kitchen door. “You’re dead, Liu. You’re fucking dead.”

Yangyang stared around the near-empty café with wide eyes and whispered, “Don’t scare the customers!”

Jaehyun glanced at the two girls in the corner absorbed in conversation and the boy near the window with his headphones on. Then he looked at Yangyang and said, “D. E. A. D.”

“He may be dead, but he’s right,” said Xiaojun, following Yangyang to the door.

“Y— _ ugh _ .” Jaehyun scowled. “We won’t even be alone, Taeil’s still here.”

“Am I?” said Taeil, emerging from the office apronless and flashing his car keys in his hands.

“Wh…you’re leaving too?” said Jaehyun.

“I’m not leaving. I have a break,” said Taeil. “I’m going to go make out with Jungwoo in my car.”

“Eugh,” said Jisung.

“Didn’t Taeyong let Jungwoo leave an hour ago?” said Jaehyun.

“Yes,” said Taeil.

“He waited for an hour to make out with you for ten minutes?”

“Alooooone tiiiiime!” Yangyang yodeled from the doorway, pointing at Jaehyun and waving spookily. Jaehyun shouted, “DO THE WORDS ‘DEATH BY ASPHYXIATION’ MEAN NOTHING TO YOU?” and Yangyang disappeared out the door, followed closely by the others.

Jaehyun bobbled around the front for a few minutes, wiping down a table, counting the items in the display case. There were two chocolate croissants left and six strawberry croissants, which looked terribly unbalanced, so he went into the kitchen to see if there were any more chocolate croissants.

Taeyong was running the food processor at the back, his face expressionless, a stoic beauty in a 19 th  century portrait. Jaehyun considered trying to say hello over the noise, but then he remembered Yangyang’s teasing. Did Jaehyun say Taeyong’s name too much? Did he sound like a high schooler drunk on puppy love?

Jaehyun pulled back the plastic wrap over the pastries on the cooling racks as the food processor fell silent. He drew out a tray of chocolate croissants. There were four left. Perfect.

“Jaehyun?” Taeyong’s voice said, sounding surprised.

Jaehyun turned around. Taeyong had his head cocked and his mouth slightly open.

“Yeah?” Jaehyun said, and Taeyong smiled.

“Oh,” he said, and grasped for the sieve next to him before lifting the bowl of the food processor off the base and upending it contents over the sieve. “When you didn’t say hi, I thought I must be wrong.”

Jaehyun mentally kicked himself. Screw Yangyang. He would never not say hi to Lee Taeyong ever again. “How did you know it was me?”

“Uh…” Taeyong was silent for a second as he sifted the flour mixture. He tilted his head again and said, “I think it was your cologne.”

“My cologne?” Jaehyun said. Was he wearing too much?

“Yeah, that kind of…teaberry…? Or else it was just…” Taeyong faltered. He seemed as perplexed as Jaehyun. “Maybe just the way you were…”

Jaehyun stood with the croissant tray against his hips.

“Some people have a distinctive…way of making sounds?” said Taeyong. “Like, your incidental noise, your footsteps and…taking trays down from the cooling racks, and stuff.”

“Oh, right,” said Jaehyun.

“You’re usually pretty quiet,” said Taeyong, “I think.” He laughed. “If it wasn’t you, then I would have guessed Xiaojun. Probably not Taeil or Jisung. Definitely not Yangyang, the kid’s like a tornado in a lightning storm.”

Jaehyun laughed. “Yeah,” he said, “he’s a nutcase. But they all left a few minutes ago.”

Taeyong raised his eyebrows. “Oh. They did?”

“Yeah, it slowed down outside,” said Jaehyun. He walked over to the baking station and balanced the croissant tray on a nearby shelf. “So Taeil let them go. I mean, Taeil’s still here. But he’s on break.”

“Probably making out with Jungwoo in his car,” said Taeyong.

Jaehyun choked a laugh. “That’s exactly what Taeil said they’re doing, how did you know that?”

“I’m clairvoyant,” said Taeyong. He had overturned the larger granules left in the sieve into the trash and was sifting the almond flour mixture a second time. “I get flashes of intuition when the spirits of the universe want to convey messages to me. Right now I’m getting a strong cosmic impression of Taeil and Jungwoo sucking face in the parking lot.”

At Jaehyun’s uncertain silence Taeyong said, “Jaehyun, I’m  _ joking _ .”

Jaehyun giggled. “Oh.”

“Did you think I was serious?”

“I mean, I don’t know!” said Jaehyun. Taeyong laughed into the back of one hand. “It wouldn’t surprise me if you were clairvoyant,” Jaehyun continued. “Just now you knew who I was without hearing my voice. Maybe you can sense energies or something.”

“Yeah, right,” said Taeyong, shifting the sifted almond flour aside and starting to mix a bowl of egg whites. “Sometimes I can’t even tell which of my roommates is in the room with me, and I’ve known them my whole life.”

“Huh,” said Jaehyun. “Really?”

“Yeah. Until they talk, I’m lost.” Taeyong shrugged. “They sound kind of similar when they move around, I guess.”

“Ah,” said Jaehyun. “But you pick up on people’s voices fast.”

Taeyong laughed and said, “Do I?”

“You recognized my voice like the second after we met,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong’s smile turned to a look of puzzlement and he frowned down at his egg whites. “Oh,” he said, “yeah, I did.”

The egg whites had turned frothy and opaque. Taeyong reached for a cup of something white—it must be sugar—and shook a bit in.

“Maybe it depends…on the person,” he said. “Anyway, when I let Jungwoo leave, he said he was going to go sit in his car and wait for Taeil to go on break so he could, quote, ‘get some good Toochies,’ and when I asked, admittedly against my better judgment, what Toochies are, he informed me that they are Taeil smoochies, which is honestly the best direction that could have gone.”

Jaehyun rested his elbow on the cold metal edge of the baking table and put his chin in his hand. “We should have warned you,” he said. “Jungwoo’s a weird one.”

Taeyong smiled. “I like him.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. He can talk and talk like nobody’s business. He’s told me everything he knows about everyone who works at this café. Well, several things he knows and several things he just hypothesizes.” Taeyong switched off the mixer, scooped a dab of whipped egg white from the bowl, and rubbed it between his thumb and forefinger thoughtfully.

“That sounds ominous,” said Jaehyun.

“It should.”

“What kind of stuff does he say?”

“Lots of things.” Taeyong, apparently having deemed the whipped eggs inadequate in some way, made a displeased face and switched the mixer back on.

Jaehyun tried to think of what Jungwoo might have said to Taeyong about him. Jungwoo didn’t know they were soulmates, unless Jisung had told him, but then again everyone seemed to have noticed how starry-eyed Jaehyun was for Taeyong. He hoped he hadn’t said anything weird.

“For example he says you’re really sexy,” said Taeyong.

Jaehyun blinked and his elbow slipped off the table so he almost hit his chin on the edge.

Taeyong laughed. “Jaehyun?”

“Uh…”

“He also said he thinks you like me,” Taeyong went on, turning the mixer to a higher setting.

Jaehyun coughed and said in a low voice, “Well he’s right.”

“So you  _ are _ really sexy is what you’re saying,” said Taeyong.

Jaehyun looked up and a surprised giggle escaped him. Taeyong snickered. A moment later they were both laughing loudly, and Taeyong turned the mixer off and set it down, running the back of his wrist over his forehead. His face was a little pink, like his hair.

“I’ve heard a lot of things from Jungwoo the others too,” he said, “especially about Yangyang. The boy sounds like chaos incarnate.”

“He is,” said Jaehyun. “He’s literally a poltergeist.”

Taeyong tested the consistency of the eggs again. “Apparently there was a time he put a whole lime in one of the ovens to see what would happen, forgot about it, and clocked out without telling anyone about it?”

“Yes! I was on that day!” Jaehyun said.

“Really?”

“It was bizarre. Around 8 o’clock at night there’s this smell of something burning, and we’re opening all the ovens and eventually we find this fat green lump of coal about to burst into flames…”

“Jesus.”

“But the reason it was so weird,” said Jaehyun, “is because none of us knew what the hell it was or how it had gotten there. We didn’t find out till like 4 days later when Taeil was telling Yangyang about it and the kid was like…Oh, shit. Taeil.”

“Huh?” Taeyong said.

“I—there’s no one in the front right now,” Jaehyun said, grabbing the croissant tray off the shelf hurriedly. “Sorry. I gotta check if there’s a customer out there. Taeil will kill me.”

“Oh,” said Taeyong, “go. We don’t want you dead.”

No sooner had Jaehyun stepped out the door of the kitchen than Taeil walked into the café, looking considerably disheveled, and eyed Jaehyun suspiciously. “Were you hanging out in the kitchen instead of manning the register?” he said as he went behind the counter.

“No,” said Jaehyun, his hands folded behind him. “I mean, just for a minute. Hey Taeil?”

Taeil reached through the door to the office to get an apron from the bin just inside and said, “What?”

“Do you think I wear too much cologne?”

Taeil paused and sniffed around Jaehyun like a police dog. Jaehyun shifted away. “Christ’s sake, don’t smell me, the customers will think we’re insane.”

“You don’t wear too much cologne.” Taeil stepped back, smiling wryly as he put his apron back on. “Who told you you wear too much cologne?”

“No one,” said Jaehyun. “I was just wondering.”


	3. Taste

One day, while Taeyong was cleaning up with Jungwoo in the kitchen and Jaehyun was in the front with Yangyang, a man around their age with purple hair walked in and bent his head to look into the pastry case. He scanned over the macarons with a critical look on his angular face.

“Can I help you?” Jaehyun asked.

The man pointed at the strawberry macarons and said, “Did Taeyong make these?”

Jaehyun was gripped by a sudden and bizarre flash of burning hatred towards this person. He shook himself. For some reason his first instinct had been to think the guy was Taeyong’s ex.

“Yes,” he said, focusing his eyes on the buttons on the cash register. “Do you know him?”

“Mm-hm. Could I have two strawberry macarons? And could you please tell him Yuta’s here?”

Yuta? What a stupid fucking name. “Sure. Yangyang, can you fill this customer’s order, please?”

“Why me?” said Yangyang, who was playing a game on his phone in the corner.

Jaehyun jerked his head towards Yuta and Yangyang rolled his eyes, putting away his phone. Jaehyun left them there and pushed into the kitchen.

“Hey Taeyong?”

“Hey Jaehyun.” Taeyong stood over the sink.

Jungwoo, who was wiping down the baking table, said, “Hey Jungwoo.”

“Uh, there’s a guy here to see you,” said Jaehyun, hesitating next to the freezer. Taeyong put down the rag he was holding and turned around.

“A guy?” he said.

“He said his name was Yuta?” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong’s face lit up. “Oh!” He dodged out from behind the baking table and said to Jungwoo, “I’ll be right back,” to which Jungwoo replied, “You’re fine, I’ll finish up here,” as Taeyong beelined for the kitchen door and Jaehyun stepped out of his way. Taeyong burst through the door and Jaehyun heard the man outside, Yuta, shout his name gleefully. He followed Taeyong to the front.

“I said I would!” Yuta was saying when Jaehyun stepped through the kitchen door. They were standing on the other side of the counter. Taeyong, who held Yuta’s wrist in one hand, shook him rather violently and said, “Yeah, like 19 times! I was starting to give up hope.”

“Well yeah, but before I only said I would  _ try _ to come early. Today I actually promised. And shouldn’t I get a discount on these macarons?”

“Did you try them yet?” Taeyong, without waiting for an answer, turned around with a beaming smile and said, “Jaehyun, this…is Jaehyun out here…?”

“I’m here,” said Jaehyun quickly, stepping out from behind the counter. At the same time Yuta, eyebrows shooting up, repeated, “ _ Jaeh—? _ ” and then cut himself off as Taeyong tightened his grip on his wrist.

“Jaehyun, this is my best friend Yuta,” Taeyong said, “he always drops me off at work and picks me up. I kept telling him he had to come visit the café before my shift ended, but he’s always late for everything, so trying to come early only ever ended up getting him here on time for my shift to end.”

“Well, I’m here now, aren’t I,” said Yuta, who was openly appraising Jaehyun. Jaehyun returned his best attempt at a non-threatening smile. He felt awful for thinking this could be Taeyong’s ex when it was clear that Yuta was perhaps the person Taeyong trusted most in the world.

“Thanks for giving Taeyong rides to work,” said Jaehyun, “the café owes you. We’d be pretty lost without him.”

“Mm,” said Yuta with a pointed eyebrow raise. Jaehyun glanced away nervously.

“Where’s Jungwoo?” said Taeyong. “I want him to come out here.”

Yangyang pushed open the kitchen door and called, “Woo! Come meet Taeyong’s friend!”

Taeyong jumped and said, “Yangyang? Sorry. I didn’t realize—”

Yangyang shook his head and told Taeyong not to worry as Jungwoo emerged from the kitchen. Taeyong introduced him to Yuta and they began to talk about the macarons as Yangyang pulled his phone back out.

“So I used to be the old pastry chef’s assistant, right?” Jungwoo told Yuta, who nodded. “She was fantastic. She was very methodical. Every process was down to the second, you know? And it worked. She was excellent. I learned a lot from her. But Taeyong’s something else. Taeyong’s got this way of feeling it out as he goes and it’s honestly so weird, I can’t wrap my head around it. I think the guy’s a baking genius.”

“ _ Woo, _ ” said Taeyong with a giggle.

“No, seriously!” Jungwoo looked at Jaehyun and Yuta and said, “I was taught in school that everything about baking is super precise, and—”

“It  _ is _ ,” said Taeyong, and Jungwoo said, “That’s the thing though,  _ you _ bend the rules.”

“In a precise way,” said Taeyong.

“What?” Jaehyun asked.

Taeyong turned towards him and said earnestly, “You can’t just throw things in willy-nilly, right? Every ingredient has a X Y Z purposes, right, and there are purposes that intersect and some that don’t. You just have to hit the right pattern of intersections.”

“That’s amazing,” said Jaehyun, not understanding but captivated nonetheless.

“Listen, I just know,” said Jungwoo, “that there’s a way you’re supposed to do things based on established knowledge, and Taeyong does everything based on feeling. On, like, instinct. There have been a couple times where I’ve looked at him doing something weird and thought, ‘oh, yep, there it is, he fucked it up,’ and then it works exactly the way he had hoped it would.”

Yuta, who was grinning as proudly as if someone had called him a baking genius, said, “You’re telling me. I’ve lived with this guy for years. Do you know how many weird ass cookies I’ve had to taste test over the years?”

“As if you didn’t love the weird ass cookies,” said Taeyong, and Yuta exclaimed, “Not the acorn cookies!”

“ _ Acorn _ cookies?” chimed Jungwoo and Jaehyun.

“Forget the acorn, forget about the acorn cookies. Try the macarons already,” said Taeyong eagerly, tapping Yuta’s arm. “What flavor did you get?”

“You said strawberry was the best flavor, so I got strawberry,” said Yuta.

Taeyong twisted his hands and said, “No, no, I said strawberry was my  _ favorite _ . But I don’t know which one’s the best  _ objectively _ . Jaehyun,” he said, his voice softening the slightest bit, “which flavor do you like most?”

Jaehyun, heart dropping like a stone, said, “Uh, I actually haven’t gotten a chance to…haven’t tried the…”

Taeyong’s eyebrows went up and drew together a tiny bit. “Oh—you haven’t had one yet?”

“Actually,” said Jaehyun, trying to laugh, “Kun yelled at me for stealing a macaron the day you first came in for training, like, a macaron from one of Yoona’s last batches, and since then I haven’t…had one.”

“Christ, you haven’t tried one of Taeyong’s macarons yet?” said Jungwoo.

“Everyone’s tried one of Taeyong’s macarons,” said Yangyang from the corner.

Jaehyun cut him a look and said quickly, “I’ve been wanting to try them.”

“Why don’t you try one right now,” said Taeyong hopefully. “Try a strawberry one. Try one of Yuta’s.”

“Try one of mine?” said Yuta, turning a bewildered look to Taeyong.

“Sure,” said Taeyong, tapping Yuta’s arm again and then finding the bag of macarons in his hands and taking it. He opened the bag, took out a macaron and gave it to Yuta before holding the other macaron out to Jaehyun. “Here.”

Jaehyun glanced at Yuta, who gave him a thin-lipped smile, and took the macaron from Taeyong’s hand. Their fingers brushed. Taeyong dropped his hands to his sides, smiling nervously. “Okay. Go ahead.”

Jaehyun gestured awkwardly towards Yuta with the macaron and said, “Thanks.” Yuta gave him a dry nod. Jaehyun bit into the strawberry macaron and made a noise of surprise.

“What?” said Taeyong.

“Mmf,” said Jaehyun, chewing and swallowing his bite. “It’s fluffier than Yoona’s. And not as sticky on my teeth. It’s amazing.”

“Is there enough strawberry?” said Taeyong. “Yuta, is there enough strawberry?”

“Euohiuh,” said Yuta, his mouth full.

“Is there enough strawberry, Jaehyun?” said Taeyong.

“Yeah,” said Jaehyun, “I can taste the strawberry for sure. Like, I don’t think I need to taste it any more than I do. Yeah, it’s perfect.”

Taeyong grinned and said, “Thanks. I’m glad you like it.”

“Yes!” said Yuta, finally swallowing, “fucking awesome!”

“Better than the acorn cookies?” said Taeyong.

“This macaron is a Picasso compared to the acorn cookies. The acorn cookies are an eight-year-old’s drawing of a T-rex compared to this macaron,” said Yuta.

“Cool,” said Taeyong, “good. Two more satisfied customers.” He clasped his hands, looking pleased.

The day at the café wasn’t the last time Jaehyun saw Yuta that week. Friday night was the semi-monthly company dinner, when everyone from the café met up at the restaurant around the corner for meat. Jaehyun spent most of dinner stewing in his jealousy of Ten, who, despite not actually working at Cranberry Café, had tagged along as he always did and somehow managed to grab the best seat in the house, i.e. the seat next to Taeyong. The two of them seemed to be having a charming time down there at the other end of the table—Jaehyun had known Ten would be able to make Taeyong laugh—while the goings-on at Jaehyun’s end consisted of Kun was arguing with Johnny as Yangyang and Hendery devised increasingly crafty ways of stealing Kun’s soju from under his nose. Eventually Ten and Taeyong were feeding each other pieces of samgyeopsal straight off the grill, and Jaehyun had to restrain himself from flinging a spoonful of egg soufflé at Ten’s face.

“Everything is relative,” Kun was saying, “and if you can save—”

Johnny said, “Murder is not relative!”

“Jaehyun? Can you back me up here?” said Kun.

Jaehyun glanced away from Taeyong, who was chewing a piece of meat that Ten had given him with a cute lopsided smile, and said, “What?”

“You okay there, buckaroo?” said Kun, grinning at Jaehyun.

“Yeah.”

“Jaehyun,” said Johnny, “Kun says Thanos is a good guy, thoughts?”

Kun pointed a finger in Johnny’s face and said, “No, don’t you twist my words, that’s not what I—” and Yangyang elbowed Hendery, who tilted Kun’s soju bottle into his water glass quickly.

“Isn’t this like the third time you guys have fought about this? Everyone’s the hero in their own story,” said Jaehyun, eyes turning back down the table. Taeyong was holding out a mushroom with a pair of chopsticks. Ten stretched his neck to grab it with his mouth but at the last moment, Taeyong pulled it back a little. Ten lunged for it before Taeyong could fake him out again and successfully snagged the mushroom off the chopsticks. Taeyong giggled.

Jaehyun felt a light slap on the side of his face and turned indignantly to Johnny, who was saying, “Yeah, but some people’s stories are just wrong, and you need to stop staring at Taeyong like you’re dying of thirst because you’re making everyone at the table feel weird.”

“I don’t feel weird,” said Yangyang. “I think it’s funny.”

“Well I feel weird,” said Hendery.

“Why don’t you two stick to stealing Kun’s soju,” said Jaehyun, and Kun rounded on Yangyang, saying, “It was  _ you _ taking my soju? You made me think I was drinking twice as much as I actually am!”

When the group finally mobilized to relocate to the bar, Ten took Taeyong’s hand and pulled him down the street to where Jaehyun was walking behind Kun and Johnny. “Hey Jaehyun,” he said. “Your new pastry chef is a gem!”

“Hey Jaehyun,” giggled Taeyong, wrist enclosed in Ten’s hand, “your roommate is a jewel.”

“I know,” said Jaehyun, annoyance dissipating at the sound of his name spoken in Taeyong’s voice.

“Finally,” said Ten, “you’ve seen the light after all these years.”

“No, no, I wasn’t agreeing with Taeyong. I was agreeing with you,” said Jaehyun. “Taeyong, just wait. Soon you’ll find out Ten’s a big brat.”

“I don’t believe it for a second,” said Taeyong, and let out a ringing laugh.

“Well,” said Ten with a sigh, “you should. He’s right. Unfortunately, I am a brat. It doesn’t matter, though, because I’m so fucking cute.”

“Did I mention that he’s a cocky brat,” said Jaehyun.

“I like to complain, too,” said Ten brightly, walking Taeyong a little to the side so Taeyong was between himself and Jaehyun.

“Ooh, me too, what about?” said Taeyong.

“Anything, but especially the fact that I haven’t found my soulmate yet. All my best friends have and I’m the only one left! Kun, Johnny, Joy, Taeil, Nayeon, and now Jaehyun. I’m sick of it!”

“Oh,” said Taeyong, blinking.

“The  _ loneliness! _ ” Ten wailed. “God, if I ever find my soulmate, I’m never letting them out of my goddamn sight. Well until I have to take a shit I guess. I know for  _ sure _ I won’t let a day go by without trying to get to know them more. To get closer to them! Ahh! To find something to  _ live _ for in this bleak, bleak world!”

“Ten, shut up,” said Jaehyun roughly.

“Sorry,” said Ten gleefully, “sorry. You guys aren’t finding my performative anguish entertaining, I’m sorry. I’ll take it somewhere else. Maybe I’ll go bother Taeil and Woo with it.”

“Ten,” said Jaehyun, “you’re so fucking annoying,” but Ten was already bouncing away, leaving Taeyong guideless and Jaehyun trying to suppress the blush he could feel in his ears and cheeks. They walked for a moment in silence, bumping shoulders and then drifting apart.

“Jaehyun,” muttered Taeyong after a second, holding out his hand, “can I…”

“Oh,” said Jaehyun and quickly raised his arm. “Yeah, of course, I’m sorry. Sorry…”

“No, no. Don’t apologize.” Taeyong, instead of placing his hand on Jaehyun’s shoulder as Jaehyun had seen him do with Jungwoo in the kitchen, slowly linked an arm through Jaehyun’s and fell into step with him. Jaehyun, taken aback by the sudden warmth, was quiet.

“Yuta’s coming to the bar,” said Taeyong. “He’s going to meet us. And my brother, too.”

“Oh,” said Jaehyun, “really?”

Taeyong nodded. “Mm-hm. Yuta hasn’t found his soulmate either, so maybe he and Ten can commiserate.”

Jaehyun laughed awkwardly. “Yeah…”

“Yeah.”

“What about your brother?” said Jaehyun.

“My brother?” Taeyong shrugged. “He’s got a soulmate. Family friend. They’ve known each other all their lives. My brother says he can’t remember ever not having color.” He laughed quietly and said under his breath, “Lucky bastards.”

“Is he older or younger?” Jaehyun asked, adding, “We’re about to step off a curb. Three…no, three, two, one.”

They stepped down seamlessly. “He’s younger,” said Taeyong, leaning into Jaehyun’s shoulder at the sound of a gaggle of teenage boys passing them loudly on their left. “Ninety-nine.”

“Ah.” They walked for a minute, listening to Kun and Johnny bickering in front of them. Jaehyun had never been this close to Taeyong before. He hoped Taeyong couldn’t feel his heart thudding.

“Also, uh,” said Jaehyun, “sorry about Ten. He can be a real pain in the ass.”

Taeyong shook his head. “It’s okay. He was right.”

“He was right?” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong shrugged, tightening his arm in Jaehyun’s a little. A moment later he asked, “Do you have any brothers? Or sisters?”

“No,” said Jaehyun, “I’m an only child. Why?”

Taeyong shrugged again. “Just wondering. Did you like it? Being an only child?”

“I hated it,” said Jaehyun, and then clamped his mouth shut in surprise.

“Really? Why?”

Jaehyun hadn’t ever said that aloud before, not in those words. Usually when people asked him this question, and they asked him a lot, he would say something like  _ it could get boring but sometimes it was nice _ , or,  _ it had its positives and negatives. _

Instead, Jaehyun said honestly, “I was lonely.” 

Taeyong made a sympathetic noise. Then he said, “Was?”

Jaehyun thought for a second. “Well…now my life has Ten, and Johnny…”

He hesitated to continue, and in the pause Taeyong said, “You and Ten are very siblingy.”

“I’ve lived with the guy for four years,” said Jaehyun. “I know things about Ten that would terrify you.”

“Maybe I’m better off not knowing them,” said Taeyong as he drew his phone out of his pocket. There was a text alert on the screen. He swiped it open easily and held it to his ear. Jaehyun heard Yuta’s voice speaking on an audio message: “ _ Mark and I are outside Bottletop. When are you getting here? _ ”

Taeyong said, “Jaehyun, how far away are we from the bar?”

Jaehyun glanced around him—he’d been so absorbed in Taeyong that he hadn’t noticed when they had turned onto the bar street—and amid the lights illuminating the passing crowds in all their roiling color and smoke, he saw the red neon sign announcing “BOTTLETOP” up the road. “Oh,” he said, “we’re almost there.”

“Almost there?”

“Like, by the time you send Yuta a message back, we’ll be able to see him.”

“Oh, okay,” said Taeyong as Jaehyun realized with horror what he’d just said and stumbled over himself to apologize. “Shit, sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“Jaehyun.”

“Sorry…”

“You say sorry too much. It’s okay. I don’t care.”

Jaehyun said, “Stupid thing to say.”

“I don’t care,” Taeyong said again. His face was serious. “I told you, you can talk about seeing things. I’d rather people just speak freely around me than always be afraid of saying the wrong thing and, like, breaking me or something. I’m not fragile.”

“No,” said Jaehyun, “no, of course not—HEY ASSHOLE, LOOK WHERE YOU’RE—”

“What?” said Taeyong just as an enormous man, drunk and reeling, slammed into Taeyong’s shoulder and then kept walking, his friends laughing at him. Hendery and Yangyang whirled around, simultaneously screaming “MOTHERFUCKER,” and Yangyang looked for a second as if he were considering going after him, but Hendery grabbed his sleeve and Yangyang just shouted “BITCHWAD!” at the man’s receding back.

“Are you okay?” said Jaehyun.

“I’m fine. I’m not fragile,” Taeyong whispered.

“I know you’re not,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong let out a breath. “What a dick.”

“Hey,” said Jaehyun, “I see Yuta,” as he caught sight of Yuta’s purple hair gleaming pinkish in the red glow from the Bottletop sign. He was sitting at a beer-stained plastic table talking to a smaller boy with darker hair. Yuta was significantly less scary-looking without the judgy stare he’d had upon meeting Jaehyun.

“If I yell his name, will he hear me from here?” said Taeyong.

“Yeah, try,” said Jaehyun, and Taeyong piped “YUTA” at the top of his lungs, which made Yuta stand up. His eyes lit on Taeyong immediately, warming for an instant and then cooling again when he saw Jaehyun arm in arm with him.

Kun and Johnny stopped under the Bottletop sign, now arguing about veganism, as Yuta reached to touch Taeyong’s hand and Taeyong removed his arm from Jaehyun’s. Taeyong put his chin on Yuta’s shoulder, and Jaehyun folded his arms against the cold.

“You’re not late for once in your life,” said Taeyong.

“I’m not even late that much.” 

“Is Markie here?” Taeyong asked, and the younger boy, still sitting at the table with a can of soda in front of him, kicked a shoe at Taeyong’s shin. “Mhm. Jaehyun, that’s my brother,” said Taeyong.

His brother’s eyes widened at the sound of Jaehyun’s name, and he looked up sharply. Jaehyun was relieved to meet a friendlier, or at least less hostile, gaze when they made eye contact than how Yuta looked at him. The kid stood up for a small bow and said, “Mark.”

“Nice to meet you, man,” he said, “I’m Jaehyun.” Mark gave him a small smile.

“And Yuta and Jaehyun, yeah, you guys know each other,” said Taeyong.

“Yep,” said Jaehyun.

“Uh huh,” said Yuta drily, gaze unamused and fixed on Jaehyun.

“Taeyong, that guy didn’t hurt you, did he?” said Yangyang as he and Hendery arrived next to them.

Yuta’s eyes rounded and he turned to Taeyong. “ _ What?” _

“Some drunk guy walked into me, I’m fine,” Taeyong muttered, and then raised his voice, “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Why don’t you guys all go ahead in and get us a table,” said Jaehyun, looking over his shoulder, “and I’ll wait for Ten and Taeil and Woo.”

“I’ll wait with you,” said Taeyong.

“Me too,” said Yuta.

Yangyang and Hendery looked at each other and Hendery said, “We’ll go in,” and they were trailed inside by Jaemin, Xiaojun, and Kun and Johnny, still deeply engaged in heated conversation. Mark, who had sat back down, watched Jaehyun and Yuta with wide eyes.

“Tae, wanna sit down?” said Yuta.

“How many seats are there?”

“Four,” Jaehyun and Yuta both said, and then looked at each other.

“Mm,” said Taeyong, “sure,” and sat where Yuta had been sitting. Mark reached a hand out to pat Taeyong’s arm without looking up from his phone.

“How long have you guys been here?” asked Taeyong.

“Like five minutes,” said Yuta. “What happened with the drunk guy—”

“He literally just walked into me. Like that’s all he did,” said Taeyong. “I was perfectly fine, Jaehyun had me.”

“Right,” said Yuta, looking at Jaehyun skeptically and leaning a hand on the rickety table. “How was dinner?”

“Good,” said Taeyong, and turned a grin up to Yuta. “Fucking—they had those fucking small mushrooms!”

“THEY HAD SMALL MUSHROOMS?” Yuta said, and just like that, both of them were suddenly dissolving in laughter. Taeyong punched at Yuta’s arm and said, “I almost asked if they had grape soda,” which made Yuta howl, and Jaehyun finally understood that he was trying to comprehend an incomprehensible inside joke and took out his phone.

“Jaehyun, you work with Taeyong, right?” Mark asked.

“Uh huh,” Jaehyun said. “I’m just a cashier though.”

“Oh,” said Mark and took a swig from his soda.

“Just a cashier?” Taeyong said suddenly, turning to Jaehyun. “You do like eight different jobs at once.”

Jaehyun laughed and said, “Eight?”

Taeyong ticked off his fingers. “Cashier, server, barista, expo, messenger, occasional diplomat—”

“ _ Diplomat…? _ ”

“Jaemin told me about the time some lady yelled at you that her yogurt parfait was too cold and was, like, demanding to see Kun and you—”

At that moment the table flipped under the pressure of Yuta’s hand and crashed to the ground, sending Mark’s soda can flying. Jaehyun watched it spiral over Yuta’s head, a stream of Coke pinwheeling out of it. Taeyong cried out and leapt to his feet.

“It’s okay,” said Yuta.

“What happened?” Taeyong yelped.

“My Coke,” said Mark.

Yuta was staring over Jaehyun’s shoulder, soda running down his face. He reached a hand towards Taeyong without looking at him and patted at his shoulder. “Nothing. I…I leaned too hard on the table.”

Jaehyun turned around to see Ten, Taeil and Jungwoo arriving behind him, looking at Yuta with alarm. “The hell happened to you?” Taeil said.

Ten walked right past Jaehyun and straight to Yuta, who said, “Goddamn,” and Ten asked, “Are you all right?” and Yuta said, “I am now.”

“You’ve got some soda on you,” said Ten. He was wearing a breathless, starlit smile that Jaehyun had never seen before.

“Yeah, uh, there was kind of a chain reaction,” said Yuta, “when I saw you.”

Jungwoo clapped a hand over his mouth. Mark’s jaw dropped and Taeyong stood next to him with a frown, head tilted.

“Can’t remember the last time I saw someone look that good with Coke dripping down their face,” said Ten.

Yuta, his dreamy expression in almost comical contrast to his usual scowl, said, “Can you remember the last time you saw someone with Coke dripping down their face?”

Ten laughed and said, “No. I mean I can’t remember the last time I saw someone look that good, period.”

“Fuck, I was going to say that about you,” said Yuta. “You stole my line.”

Ten, pulling his sweater sleeve from his jacket and bundling it in his hand, said, “Boo-hoo.” He raised the heel of his hand to dab Yuta’s face dry. Yuta blinked at him tenderly. Behind Jaehyun, Taeil and Jungwoo were making silent screaming faces and hitting each other.

“What do you know,” said Ten, “you’re even more good-looking without Coke on your face.” He ran his knuckles over Yuta’s hair. “What color is this?”

“Hairdresser told me purple would look good, so I said okay,” said Yuta. “What does it look like?”

Ten’s mouth moved wordlessly for a second and then he said, “Good,” and they both laughed. Jaehyun took his phone out of his pocket and texted Johnny,  _ “GET .THE FUCK OUT HERE I THINK TEN JUST FOUND HIS SOULMATE” _

“What’s your name?” said Yuta.

“Ten. What’s yours?”

“Yuta.”

“Yuta,” Ten repeated. Their smiles mirrored each other. Jaehyun’s phone buzzed. He ignored it.

“Ten, I think I have a crush on you,” said Yuta.

“Crazy question,” said Ten, “how weird would it be if we kissed right now?”

Jungwoo snorted and Taeil whispered at him, “ _ SHUT UP! _ ”

“So weird,” said Yuta. “We should probably do it.”

“Yeah, we should probably…”

Yuta bent his face to Ten’s and kissed him just as Johnny burst through the door onto the street, tailed by Kun and the boys, who all pointed at Ten and started yelling. Jaehyun tried to relay what had happened, while Taeyong explained that Yuta was his best friend and asked if they had actually kissed, to which Jungwoo replied, yes, and in fact they were  _ still _ kissing. Most impressively, Yuta and Ten ignored everyone and kept making out, even when Hendery started making gagging noises and Kun decided it was time to round everyone up and send them back inside. Jaehyun, the last to go, said, “Are you guys coming in?” and Ten briefly unentwined one hand from Yuta’s hair to give Jaehyun a short wave.

Johnny, who loved finding reasons to buy everyone shots, bought everyone shots, and then the two shots that he had gotten for Yuta and Ten themselves sat idly on the bar as Johnny and Xiaojun went to throw darts while Hendery, Yangyang and Jaemin became involved in an intense drinking game, the rules of which were unclear. Taeyong curled up next to Mark at their table. They all agreed to a game of Never-Have-I-Ever, but it got boring and petered out quickly. Jaehyun wondered how Taeyong was so vibrant to him, how his voice was so clear, even in such a dim, loud room.

“I’m going to get another drink,” said Jaehyun after finishing his beer. “Does anyone want anything?”

“More shots,” slurred Jungwoo.

“No more shots,” said Taeil.

Taeyong stood up and said, “I want something.” He held his hand out towards Jaehyun.

Jaehyun looked at Taeyong’s outstretched hand and took a breath. Mark, eyebrows raised, tapped Jaehyun’s arm. Jaehyun nodded quickly, said, “Uh huh,” and took Taeyong’s hand.

Taeyong followed him past Johnny and Xiaojun to the bar. “Careful,” said Jaehyun as they sat down, “Yuta and Ten’s vodka shots are still here.”

“Ah?”

Jaehyun guided Taeyong’s fingers to the tops of the shot glasses, and Taeyong’s hand closed around them. A little smile crept onto his face. “Should we take them?”

Jaehyun laughed. “You want to?”

Taeyong said, “If you want to.”

“Hey,” said Xiaojun, peeking his head around Jaehyun’s, “Johnny and I have a bet on those two shots.”

“You’ll have to bet on two other shots, because these are ours now,” said Jaehyun. Xiaojun glanced between them amusedly and disappeared again.

Taeyong picked up the glasses and held one out. Jaehyun took it delicately and Taeyong said, “Cheers.”

“Cheers,” said Jaehyun, knocking the glass with Taeyong’s. They threw them back, or Taeyong threw his back while Jaehyun struggled to empty his glass. “Eww,” said Taeyong as Jaehyun finished the shot.

“It tastes like rubbing alcohol,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong nodded. “It tastes like my cat died.”

“It tastes like the world ending in 2050 from global warming,” said Jaehyun.

“It tastes like the scene in Game of Thrones where the old man accidentally eats his own kid in a pie,” said Taeyong.

They laughed loudly enough for Johnny to turn around and yell at them about distracting him from darts, and Jaehyun gave him the finger. Then Taeyong said, “Jaehyun.”

“Mm?”

“Can you read me the cocktails from the menu?”

“Oh.” Jaehyun grabbed a menu from down the bar. “Yeah. What kind of thing do you want?”

Taeyong’s fingernails tapped at the bar and he said, “Don’t know yet. I want to hear all of them.”

“Okay,” said Jaehyun, and opened to the cocktails page. “Hmm. Whiskey sour. Bellini. Mojito. Martini. Margarita, strawberry margarita, Bottletop Vortex…”

“That sounds fun,” Taeyong said, swiveling his barstool so his knees collided with Jaehyun’s and quickly swiveling away again. “What’s in it?”

“The Bottletop Vortex?”

“Mhm.”

“Uhh…” Jaehyun traced the fancy script on the laminated menu and read, “‘ _ Bottletop’s signature cocktail made from mint and jalapeño’ _ …Mint and  _ jalapeño? _ ”

“Ooh!” said Taeyong.

“‘ _ Mint and jalapeño puree blended with gin, Prosecco and lime juice _ .’ Sounds interesting?”

“I’m getting that. You should get a Bellini,” said Taeyong, and raised his hand to call for the bartender.

“A Bellini? Why?”

“The peach,” said Taeyong, as if this were self-explanatory. “Is the bartender nearby?”

“Wait, wh—yeah. He sees you. He’s coming over in a second. The peach?”

Taeyong put down his hand. “A Bellini is soft and peachy. You’re soft and peachy.”

“What can I get you?” said the bartender as he approached, and Taeyong said brightly, “A Bellini and a Bottletop Vortex, please.”

“Sure. Pay now or tab?”

Jaehyun said, “Hey Taeyong, can I get this round…?”

“No,” said Taeyong, holding a pair of bills over the counter to the bartender. “Now, please.”

The bartender took the cash and left. Taeyong folded his hands on the bar, looking pleased with himself. “Thanks,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong smiled and nodded.

Jaehyun looked around the bar. “I think your brother’s boyfriend is here,” he said.

“Oh yeah? Short kid with stud earrings? Probably got a leather jacket on?”

“Yeah. They’re with Kun and Woo and Taeil,” said Jaehyun. “But I still don’t see Yuta and Ten.”

Taeyong laughed. “Yeah, what the hell are they doing? Should we check on them?”

“Nah, they’re probably having deep talks outside,” Jaehyun said. The bartender placed a few thousand won bills on the counter in front of Taeyong and Jaehyun added, “Your change. Change is here.”

“Oh, thanks,” said Taeyong, reaching for the bills and putting them back in his pocket.

Jaehyun watched the bartender dump an assortment of ingredients into two glasses as if he were tossing together a witch’s brew and thought about what Taeyong had said about him being soft and peachy. Taeyong rested his head in his hand and said, “So. Your best friend and my best friend.”

“Uh huh,” said Jaehyun.

“Are soulmates,” said Taeyong.

“Yuta doesn’t like me,” Jaehyun said, looking down the bar.

Taeyong tried not to smile. “Well he’ll have to like you now. You’re his soulmate’s best friend.”

“I don’t know how much that’ll help me,” said Jaehyun, “if saying I was his best friend’s soulmate didn’t make him my fan.”

Taeyong bit his lip. Jaehyun wondered if he shouldn’t have said anything. A second later Taeyong said, “Sometimes I think Yuta’s even more afraid of me getting hurt again than I am.” A tiny laugh, or more of a short breath of air, left him and he said, “And I’m pretty damn afraid.”

Jaehyun’s heart broke a little. He tried to joke, “If I were Yuta I guess I’d want to cut anyone who came near you too,” which made Taeyong smile.

“Yeah. Yeah, he’s pretty protective. But lately it’s like…” Taeyong hesitated. “He thinks any little gust of wind might shatter me any second. Like I’m made of glass.”

Jaehyun frowned. Taeyong’s face was aimed down and his pretty mouth was drawn sideways.

“He didn’t treat me like that before,” said Taeyong. “Before the breakup, I mean. Now he goes out of his way to avoid talking about it. To avoid talking about anything…anything he thinks might…”

Jaehyun watched Taeyong’s fingertips tracing the rim of the shot glass. After a few seconds he said, “How long ago was it?”

Taeyong raised his face. “The breakup?”

Jaehyun nodded, and then verbalized, “Mm-hm.”

“Four months,” Taeyong said.

Jaehyun winced. “Not…not very long.”

Taeyong shook his head. He cleared his throat and continued, “We met in my last year of college. He was my English tutor.”

“Oh,” said Jaehyun.

“The second time we met up, he told me he’d gotten color when he met me,” Taeyong said,” and I believed every word out of his mouth. He was so smart and sweet and good to me. I thought I loved him. I  _ did _ love him.”

Jaehyun listened, mouth slightly open.

“I loved him for two and a half years, and then one day we’re on the bus and he starts crying, and he’s like, ‘I’m sorry, it wasn’t supposed to go on this long,’ and I asked what, and he said he had lied to me and that he kept on planning to tell me the truth but there was never a right time and he thought maybe he’d never have to tell me, maybe neither of us would ever meet our soulmates and we could be happy with each other,” Taeyong said, “and I asked why he was telling me now and he said it was because he’d gotten color two weeks ago and he was in love with her. And so I got off the bus and made Yuta come get me and I never saw him again.”

Jaehyun’s throat was tight. Taeyong was still for a second. Then he shifted the back of his hand and brushed Jaehyun’s arm, as if to check that he were still sitting there. Jaehyun tentatively put a hand on Taeyong’s shoulder before lifting it off again.

Taeyong said, “And I want to—I  _ want _ to get over it, I want to just leave him behind and forget it ever happened and be brand new but—”

“It’s okay,” said Jaehyun, “you don’t have to be brand new, you’re fine the way you are. You’re incredible.”

Taeyong wiped at his nose and put his chin back in his hand.

“You’re strong,” said Jaehyun, “you’ve overcome so much, and you’re so bright. You’re such a vibrant person. You don’t have to change. Everyone has scars.”

Taeyong smiled a little into his knuckles. Jaehyun put his own chin in his hand and looked at him.

“Everyone has scars?” Taeyong said. “What are yours?”

Jaehyun said, “My scars?”

“Sure,” said Taeyong, shrugging, “or your worst fears, or deepest regrets, I don’t know.”

Jaehyun gazed down the bar, to where the bartender was shaking something. The everything-stews which he had been throwing together a few minutes ago must have been somebody else’s, because they were gone. “I was alone a lot,” he found himself saying, “as a kid.”

Taeyong nodded. “No siblings.”

Jaehyun exhaled slowly. “Yeah. My parents…they’re awesome. They worked their asses off. For me.”

“Mm hm,” said Taeyong.

“But they worked so much,” said Jaehyun, “that they didn’t have a lot of time for me.”

Taeyong hung his head. “Oh.”

“My aunt took care of me when I was little, but then she got married and moved to Busan,” said Jaehyun, “and it was just me, sometimes. I’d get home from school and be by myself till my mom got home at 8 and then my dad at, like, 9 or 10. And when they got home, they were usually too tired to help me with my homework or play…”

Taeyong turned towards Jaehyun so their knees rested against each other again. Jaehyun swallowed and said, “Sometimes I’d go over to a friend’s house or something. And in the summers for a few years, I went to my grandparents’ place outside the city and that was, like, the best thing ever. And my parents took me on weekend trips too. Sometimes.”

“It doesn’t sound like it was enough,” said Taeyong gently.

Jaehyun nodded and admitted, “It was a little scary when it got dark early in the winter.”

“Oh, Jaehyun,” murmured Taeyong.

Jaehyun placed his palms flat on the bar. “Sometimes it was great. I had my run of the place. One time I found a gecko and brought him home and kept him in the sink in my bathroom for four days before they noticed. Dude’s name was Speck.”

“Speck kept you company,” chuckled Taeyong.

“Speck was my guy. And honestly, I was okay. I just listened to the radio all the time. And then my parents got me an iPod one year, holy shit.” Jaehyun blew out a stream of air. “I was set. Music was my best friend.”

Taeyong smiled. “Music is the best friend anyone could have. It’s always there for you.”

“Yeah! And it’s always changing, so you never get bored of it,” said Jaehyun.

“It’s always new, but it never gets mad at you or judges you,” said Taeyong. “It never lets you down.”

Jaehyun grinned as the bartender appeared in front of them, finally placing their drinks on the bar. “Vortex, Peach Bellini.”

“Thank you,” said Jaehyun, sliding the greenish drink towards Taeyong’s hand. Taeyong closed his fingers around it. “Should we try them?”

Jaehyun picked up his Bellini. “Yeah. One, two, three.”

The peach drink was velvety on Jaehyun’s tongue. He wasn’t sure he’d ever had one of these before. He glanced up at Taeyong’s face, which was screwed up in a frown that looked less displeased than simply confused.

“Oh, it’s weird,” said Taeyong.

“Is it?” said Jaehyun with a laugh.

“They said mint and jalapeño, right?” Taeyong took another sip from the glass, ignoring or perhaps not noticing the straw, and shook his head in perplexity. “Yeah, the mint got lost on the way to the party.”

“Is it good?”

“Good,” said Taeyong. “But spicy. What’s yours like?”

Jaehyun looked at the pale orange glass speckled with bubbles. “Peachy.”

“Switch,” Taeyong said, pushing the gin drink towards Jaehyun.

“Okay,” said Jaehyun, handing Taeyong the Bellini and picking up the gin drink. He considered the straw for a moment and then pushed it aside.

“You first,” said Taeyong.

Jaehyun, who was already taking a sip, made an “mm” noise and cleared his throat before drinking again. “It’s,” he coughed, holding it away from his mouth, “it’s so spicy.”

“Makes you feel like a firebreathing dragon,” said Taeyong.

“Tastes like when you turn on the shower and run it hot and then step in without checking the water first and get your skin boiled,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong, nodding and laughing, added, “It tastes like dropping a glass on the floor and knowing it’s about to break into a million pieces and you can’t do anything about it.”

“It tastes like a paper cut,” said Jaehyun.

“Oh, now you’ve gone too far,” said Taeyong.

“No, you’re right. This drink doesn’t deserve that.” He set it down next to him.

“Here,” said Taeyong, “have some Bellini to wash away the spice.”

Jaehyun accepted the peach drink, took a swallow and passed it back to Taeyong. “Okay,” he said, “now you try.”

As Taeyong took a long sip, Jaehyun said, “It tastes like uh…going up in a Ferris wheel at sunset. The evening breeze.”

Taeyong nodded and lowered the glass from his lips. “Yeah. It tastes like when you say my name.”

Jaehyun’s brain froze. “Hm?”

Taeyong paused briefly and said, “You know. It’s smooth…and sweet? It just reminds me of how your voice sounds when you come into the kitchen and…”

Jaehyun couldn’t think of anything to say and even if he wanted to speak, he thought he might giggle or cry instead. Taeyong shook himself and said, “Come on, it’s your turn.”

Suddenly there was an uproar behind them, and they turned around to find Ten and Yuta emerging out of the cold like homecoming kings, Ten with one hand wrapped around Yuta’s waist and tucked into Yuta’s opposite coat pocket. Ten pointed at Taeil and Johnny, who were pointing at him, and shouted unintelligibly. Yuta, grinning like a ray of sun, said something to Mark, who punched his shoulder a few times. Then he scanned the room and met Jaehyun’s eyes. His grin waned but didn’t disappear. He pointed at Jaehyun, pointed at Taeyong, and jerked his thumb towards himself.

“Yuta wants to see you,” said Jaehyun, getting off the barstool. Taeyong nodded, smiling like a kid, and held out his free hand. Jaehyun took it.


	4. Sound

“So, green,” said Ten a few hours later, pointing across the bar to a man in a green and black shirt, and then he pointed at Jaehyun’s jacket. “And maroon.” His hand swiveled to Taeyong, who was talking to Yuta at the other end of the table, and finished, “And red.”

“Red? Taeyong?” Jaehyun said, giving him a look of confusion.

“Well, no. Taeyong is orange. Orange? I mean his hair.”

Jaehyun stared at Ten and said, “I’m convinced you don’t listen to anything I say.”

“What!”

“His hair is pink. PINK! I’ve been screaming about it since the second I saw him.”

“Piiink,” said Ten, nodding openmouthed, and Jaehyun emphasized, “Pink pink pink!”

“Ahhh,” said Ten, his eyes drifting from Taeyong’s hair to Yuta, “look at him. Holy balls! Who looks that good?”

“I know,” said Jaehyun, watching Taeyong’s mouth and hands move as he described something evidently very exciting to Yuta. “He’s unreal.”

“I was all mad it was taking so long for my soulmate to crop up,” said Ten, “but, fuck, it was worth the wait. I’d wait another hundred years just to get a sip of his leftover cereal milk if that was what it took.”

Jaehyun turned a disgusted look to Ten and said, “Leftover c—that’s fucking gross.”

“It’s not really gross,” said Ten.

Jaehyun looked back at Taeyong and said, “It makes me uncomfortable and I don’t know why.”

Yuta’s eyes flickered away from Taeyong’s face to Ten and Jaehyun. He smiled. Ten stuck his tongue out at him. Yuta gave a puppy-eyed pout and Ten, rolling his eyes exaggeratedly, blew a kiss that Yuta caught and mimed putting in his pocket. Ten told Jaehyun, “You’re just jealous of what we have.”

“So what if I am,” grumbled Jaehyun into his empty glass.

Ten considered this and the corners of his mouth pulled down in a maudlin expression. “Wait. Sorry,” he said, and slapped a hand onto his forehead. “Sorry, ahh, sorry. I forgot Taeyong still doesn’t believe you.”

Jaehyun groaned. “You’re so fucking stupid when you’re drunk. Taeyong doesn’t  _ not believe me _ .”

Ten looked at him happily and said, “So he believes you now?”

Jaehyun tilted the beer suds at the bottom of his glass from side to side. “He…he…”

“Yeahh,” said Ten.

“He doesn’t not believe me! He just can’t…he’s still getting over his ex. It was only like four months ago.”

“Ew, fuck that,” said Ten sorrowfully.

Jaehyun sighed. “And I was kidding about being jealous, Tennie,” he said. “I’m really happy for you. I’m seriously so psyched.”

Ten put his head on Jaehyun’s shoulder and trilled a little giggle. “I can’t wait to fall in love with him. I’m so fucking excited. Hell. I probably already am in love with him maybe. I can’t wait to fall more in love with him.”

“That’s so cute,” said Jaehyun.

“Did you feel like this when you saw him?” asked Ten.

“What? No. I didn’t know who he was or anything, he just came to the café trying to buy macarons. Actually, I thought he might be Taeyong’s ex and almost stabbed him in the jugular with a butter knife.”

Ten smacked Jaehyun’s chin and said, “Not Yuta, dipshit. Taeyong. When you first saw Taeyong.”

“Oh,” said Jaehyun. “Like I couldn’t wait to fall in love with him?”

“Mm hm.”

“I guess,” said Jaehyun. Taeyong was smiling as he listened to Yuta speaking. It wasn’t his usual warm, small smile, but a big toothy one. Jaehyun wondered if he would ever get that smile out of Taeyong. “I think I just wanted to look and look and look at him,” he said.

“YES,” said Ten, snapping his fingers so suddenly that Jaehyun jumped a little, “that’s the feeling. You just want to STARE. And kiss, but then when you kiss, you can’t stare. It’s so messed up. How did the human body not evolve so we could kiss and stare at each other at the same time?”

“You’re so drunk.”

“No, I’m Aristotle. I’m the next fucking Charles Darwin. Hey!” Ten sat up and turned to Jaehyun with wide eyes. “Imagine the  _ double dates! _ ”

“The double dates?” said Jaehyun.

“Like—” Ten made a circular motion with his hand and said, “Once Taeyong gets over his ex and falls in love with you and all that, imagine the double dates we’re going to go on together! The four of us!”

Jaehyun laughed and said, “Yeah. That did occur to me at one point.”

“Jaehyun, what’s your favorite color?” said Ten, falling against his shoulder again.

Jaehyun, feeling a little dejected for some reason, shifted so he could cuddle closer to Ten. “I don’t know. I’m still deciding.”

“Would it be really, really lame if I’m pretty sure my favorite color is purple?”

“Like his hair?”

Ten giggled. “Mhm.”

“Okay, first of all, maybe it is lame, but if you say your favorite color is purple, then I’m allowed to say my favorite color is pink and we’ll be lame together,” Jaehyun said. “But Ten, you’ve had color for like four hours. Plus it’s night. Plus you’ve barely left this room. I guarantee you there are at least a hundred and nine colors you haven’t seen yet. You probably haven’t—oh, fuck, you didn’t see turquoise yet. Did you see turquoise yet?” Jaehyun dug out his phone and got on the internet, saying, “God, fuck, wait till you see turquoise. It’s fucking pretty, fuuuuck.”

Jaehyun pulled up images of turquoise and Ten gasped, “FUCK.”

“Fucking crazy, right?”

“You’re on one percent. Why is the little battery guy red?”

“Oh, fuck that, it was on 30% like ten minutes ago,” said Jaehyun. “Uh, red means danger I think. Do you have your portable charger with you?”

“No. What do you mean, red means danger?”

“You know how people say blue is sad? It’s like that. A lot of colors have meanings. Yellow means happiness.”

“I thought red meant love, though.”

Jaehyun paused and said, “Oh. Huh. I don’t know. I think there are different…”

“What does purple mean?” said Ten.

As Jaehyun answered, “Mmm…I don’t know, maybe ask Johnny,” his phone died in his hand. Ten barked a laugh. “Ah, fuck,” said Jaehyun, “fuck this piece of shit.”

“What’s a piece of shit?” said Taeyong’s voice, and they looked up to see Yuta and Taeyong standing over them, Taeyong putting his arms through the sleeves of his coat. Behind them, Kun and Johnny were gathering their things. Jungwoo and Taeil stood at the door. The younger boys had gone home a while ago.

“My phone died,” said Jaehyun. Taeyong made a face sympathetically.

Ten reached a hand up to Yuta, who gripped his wrist and yanked him into a standing position. They smiled shyly at each other and Yuta said, “Everybody’s heading out.”

“You’re welcome to spend the night with me,” said Ten, “uh, at our place, if you want.”

Yuta bit his lip as he smiled, and then he glanced at Jaehyun. “Do you mind?” he asked.

Jaehyun shook his head. “No, it’s—”

“You can sleep at our place,” said Taeyong.

Yuta’s eyebrows rose. “He can?”

“We have a big couch,” said Taeyong earnestly, “and plenty of blankets and pillows. And you can use my charger. Just so, like, Ten and Yuta can have some space.”

“Ah,” said Jaehyun.

“But you’ll have to be quiet, because Mark is probably already asleep,” Taeyong added.

“Hey, lovebirds,” called Johnny, waving from the door. “You staying or going?”

Yuta and Ten looked at Jaehyun, who said, “No, yeah, that sounds great. If you’re sure you don’t mind.”

“It’s no problem,” said Taeyong. Ten squeezed Jaehyun’s arm and said, “Thank you, best friend.”

They all went down the road to get cabs and said goodbye two by two. Before Yuta and Ten got into their cab, Yuta wrapped Taeyong up in a tight hug, kissed his cheek, and said, “I love you so much,” smiling when Taeyong answered, “I love you more.” Ten just whispered “I’ll text you when it’s safe to come home” and gave Jaehyun finger guns as he got into the cab.

On opposite sides of the cab home, Jaehyun and Taeyong, both solemnly swearing not to relay any of the information discussed to their own best friends, exchanged bits of what Yuta and Ten had said to them about each other. When they got into the apartment, Taeyong let the door fall shut without turning on the lights, and Jaehyun blinked in the darkness as Taeyong blithely took off his shoes and whispered not to wake up Mark again. Taeyong went further into the apartment, saying, “I’ll get blankets out of the closet. The bathroom is down that hallway. Jaehyun?”

“Sorry,” said Jaehyun from the entryway, “I uh—don’t know where—”

Taeyong gasped. “Oh! I forgot to turn on the lights! I’m sorry! There’s a lightswitch uh…next to the…actually I don’t know where the lightswitches are.”

“Oh,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong giggled and a low laugh escaped Jaehyun in spite of himself.

“Here, let’s just—I’ll just feel along the wall for it,” said Taeyong, and Jaehyun agreed, “Okay,” placing both hands on the cool wallpaper. “I know there’s one near the door somewhere,” said Taeyong as Jaehyun patted along at eye level. Finding nothing, he switched to the opposite wall, where after a moment he felt Taeyong’s hand fall on his.

They stopped moving. Taeyong didn’t lift his hand. Jaehyun could hear his breathing very close and, further away, the ticking of an analog clock. He turned his body away from the wall, to Taeyong, who was still.

Jaehyun shifted his hand and felt Taeyong’s fingers thread through his own. They were cold, like always. Jaehyun drew Taeyong’s hand to him and pressed it to his heart. Taeyong turned it over, flattening his palm onto Jaehyun’s chest.

The clock ticked once for every two times Jaehyun’s heart beat against Taeyong’s hand. One tick—two—three—four—five. Then Taeyong’s hand fell and he stepped away.

“Can you use your phone flashlight,” he said, his voice receding into the apartment as his footsteps crossed the room.

Jaehyun was silent.

“J…Jaehyun…” said Taeyong.

“My phone is dead,” said Jaehyun.

There was a shuffling sound and Taeyong pulled up the window shades on the other side of the room, illuminating it in shades of moonlight. Taeyong’s face was still dark and inscrutable as it had been the first time he walked in the café.

“Can you see more now?” he said softly.

“Yeah.” Jaehyun reached over the couch against one wall and hit a lightswitch there. It was strange, how light transformed the colors of things. Now the sky outside the window, which had been a silvery shade of blue in the dark, had gone pitch black.

Taeyong gave him blankets, pillows, a glass of water, a charger, made sure he knew where the bathroom was and that he was welcome to the food in the refrigerator. He asked if Jaehyun needed anything else three or four times. Jaehyun said no. Taeyong nodded, standing for a moment at the edge of the living room with his arms folded tightly to him. Then he said, “Good night.”

“Good night,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong nodded, wavered, and then turned around and disappeared down the hall. Jaehyun let out a sigh and leaned his head back.

He drifted in and out of half-conscious dreams through the three hours until sunrise, when the light through the windows woke him up fully. They’d both forgotten to close the window shades again. He picked up his phone, clicked through some social media apps, felt hollower than before he’d opened them, and rose to look around the living room. It was immaculately organized, just like he had expected Taeyong’s house to be. Everything was blocky and soft-edged. There were no stray papers or books or earphones scattered on the furniture like at his and Ten’s house; everything was neatly arranged on the shelves in the wall, and bags and coats all hung on pegs. He noticed that he’d left his shoes in the middle of the entry hallway while Taeyong had put his on a low shelf. He went to pick them up.

The living room opened into an equally spotless kitchen, which was now heavily bathed in the gold light coming sideways through the living room windows. Jaehyun went to refill his water glass and was looking out the window at the alley behind the stores on the next street when Taeyong appeared, small in his sweatpants and T-shirt, and opened a cabinet over his head.

Jaehyun coughed and said, “Hi,” and Taeyong turned around.

“You’re up already?”

“I couldn’t sleep.”

Taeyong’s hands paused and then opened a different cabinet and felt inside it. “I’ll make coffee. Do you want an apple? We don’t really have any decent breakfast food but I could put the rice cooker on.”

“No,” said Jaehyun, “that’s okay. Just coffee would be great.”

“Okay,” said Taeyong. “You can sit down at the table if you want.”

“Can I help you?”

“No,” said Taeyong, “no. I’ve got it.”

Jaehyun pulled out a chair and sat down. Taeyong put the coffee on to brew and turned around, leaning against the counter. The dawn light was pretty on him. It reminded Jaehyun of the cold morning a month ago in the park under the cherry blossoms. He realized that barely anything had changed since then.

“I’m sorry you didn’t sleep well,” said Taeyong.

“It’s fine.”

“Was the couch too hard? I should have given you more pillows…”

“No,” said Jaehyun, “no, it wasn’t the couch.”

Jaehyun’s water glass cast a long, translucent shadow across the round white table. The light seemed to drip over his hand as he turned it this way and that.

“Did you sleep okay?” he asked.

Taeyong shrugged. “Sort of. Do you want cream and sugar?”

“Sugar,” said Jaehyun, “please.”

“How much?”

“One scoop.”

Taeyong poured the coffee, filling his own mug half to the top with milk and giving Jaehyun a heaping spoonful of sugar, and brought them one by one to the table. His coffee spilled slightly when he set it down. Jaehyun reached for a paper towel and wiped it up.

Taeyong sat down and Jaehyun said, “Thank you.”

“Mhm,” said Taeyong.

Jaehyun blew on his coffee and sipped it. It was sweeter than he usually took it.

“Is it enough sugar?” said Taeyong.

“Yeah.”

“Last night was fun with everybody,” said Taeyong.

“Yeah, it was fun,” said Jaehyun.

“How do you think Yuta and Ten are doing?”

Jaehyun cleared his throat and said, “Taeyong, I have to ask you something or I’m going to lose my mind.”

The smile dropped from Taeyong’s face. He let go of his coffee mug. “You can ask anything,” he said.

“Do you ever…” Jaehyun cleared his throat again. “Are there ever moments where you think it might be me?”

Taeyong lowered his face. Jaehyun said, “Or am I just some nobody who wants something from you that you can’t give?”

“No,” said Taeyong quickly, hurt bleeding into his voice, “no, no. You’re not nobody. No.”

“Then what am I?”

Taeyong picked up his coffee mug and held it between his hands. “There are moments where I think it might be you,” he said. “There are moments where I think it could only be you. I…” He was silent for a second. “The more I think that, the more scared I get.”

Jaehyun stared at him, at the light pouring over his thin frame, at his bright skin, his hair, the steam rising from the coffee past his lips.

“Why?” he said.

Taeyong said quietly, “Because the more important you are to me, the more I have to lose.”

Jaehyun leaned forward. “Taeyong, you’re not going to lose me. You’re my soulmate. I’m yours. If I ever walk away from you, I’m as good as dead.”

Taeyong nodded into his mug. “Yeah, you’ll never leave me, you’ll never lie to me, etcetera.”

Jaehyun drew back, folding his hands between his knees. Taeyong blinked a few times. “I—I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…that came out wrong.”

“Right,” said Jaehyun.

“I just don’t know,” said Taeyong, slowly, as if controlling tears, “how to trust what people tell me…”

“Then don’t trust what people tell you,” said Jaehyun and stood up. Taeyong, brows knit, turned his face upwards as Jaehyun’s voice moved.

“Don’t trust anyone. Don’t listen to me,” said Jaehyun. “Don’t listen to anything. Just trust yourself. Trust what you feel. Decide for yourself. Fuck what I say or what Yuta or Mark says.”

“What I say?” said Mark, appearing from the hallway and looking with wide eyes between Jaehyun and Taeyong, who was still sitting at the table, his face crumpling.

“Sorry,” said Jaehyun, “I was just leaving. Thanks for the coffee, Taeyong.”

“What the fuck?” said Mark as Jaehyun got his shoes on and opened the door. Before it fell shut behind him, he heard Taeyong let out a sob.

When Jaehyun walked into his apartment a half hour later, he almost opened the door on Yuta, who was standing just inside it and taking down his coat while Ten was asking, “But why? What did he say to him?” As the door swung open, they turned to look at him and Yuta’s face immediately darkened.

“We’re going to have to find out,” said Yuta in a low voice, shrugging his coat on and turning back to Ten, who put a hand on his shoulder. “I’m really sorry I can’t stay longer.”

“You said that already,” said Ten sweetly, patting his coat smooth.

“But I  _ am _ ,” said Yuta. Jaehyun rolled his eyes and pushed past them into the apartment, trying to ignore the feeling of Yuta’s glare boring holes in the back of his head.

“You’ll live. Will you text me when you get home?” he heard Ten say, and Yuta answered, “Yeah, and we’ll see about dinner and stuff. Okay?”

“Oh, yeah! First soulmate date!” said Ten.

“First souldate.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Get out of my house.”

Jaehyun poured himself a bowl of cereal in the pause that followed. “Bye,” Ten said eventually, and Yuta said, “Bye, Ten,” and then there was another pause during which he did not hear the door open, and then Ten was laughing, “I said to get OUT of my HOUSE,” and Yuta said, “Okay, okay, bye,” and the door latch finally clicked.

Jaehyun ate his cereal without tasting much as Ten came back into the apartment, swinging his arms and legs like a jovial toy soldier. He wandered around the kitchen aimlessly for a second before sitting down across from Jaehyun. Jaehyun looked up at him, shoveling cereal into his mouth. Ten smiled at him blissfully and said, “Ahhhhh.” 

“How was it?” said Jaehyun.

Ten’s grin widened, then suddenly shrank. “Oh, wait. What happened? Yuta said you made Taeyong cry.”

Jaehyun sighed into his cereal. “Who told him that?”

“Mark,” said Ten.

Jaehyun shook his head. “Last night when we got back to his apartment I thought for a second he was going to kiss me, or…I don’t know. I don’t know what I thought he was going to do. I’m pretty sure  _ he _ didn’t know what he thought he was going to do.” He stirred his cereal. “And I thought my head was going to explode, so I asked him what I am to him, like, not am I his boyfriend or something, just, you know, am I a walnut or what?”

“I mean, it’s obvious you mean more to him than a walnut,” said Ten.

“Is it,” Jaehyun muttered.

Ten snorted. “Yeah, okay, stay in denial about that one. If you don’t see how he is around you, I can’t help you.”

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me. What did he say when you asked him that?”

Jaehyun wiped at a drip of milk on his chin. “That he’s scared.”

“Fucking hell.”

“That was why he was crying.”

“Fuck.”

“I wish I…” Jaehyun dropped his spoon into his cereal and put his face in his hands.

“Hey,” said Ten, scooting his chair closer to him to rub the back of his neck. “Hey. Just give him time. It’ll work out. You guys are soulmates, remember? You end up together. That’s how the story goes.”

Jaehyun sat with his hands covering his face for a moment. Then, his voice muffled, he said, “Sorry Yuta left early because of us.”

“It’s okay. I needed to go to sleep at some point,” said Ten.

Jaehyun parted his fingers and peeked through them. “Y’all went  _ all night? _ ”

Ten tried not to grin, pressed his lips into a thin line, and then let a smile break over his face. “We didn’t actually bang. We were too nervous. So we just talked for like four hours.”

“You were  _ too nervous _ ,” said Jaehyun, putting his hands over his mouth and laughing into them. “That is so fucking cute.”

“Sucked his dick by the end of it though,” Ten said cheerfully, and Jaehyun groaned. “Jesus, you ruined it.”

“Jaehyun,” said Ten seriously, “the  _ high quality _ of dick I am going to be getting for the rest of my life…I can’t even express to you. I am so blessed. I am thanking my lucky stars.”

“I don’t want to hear about Yuta’s dick,” Jaehyun shouted, getting up to dump the remainder of his cereal.

“If I can’t tell  _ you _ , then who am I supposed to tell?”

“Someone whose guts Yuta doesn’t hate!”

“Yuta won’t hate your guts for long, because I’m going to set him straight on you, okay? And you’re my best friend, so I need you,” Ten said, following Jaehyun towards the bathroom, “to understand the superiority…”

Jaehyun turned around and said, “Fine, get it out of your system. Go ahead. Tell me.” He shook him by the shoulders.

“The dude’s like a fucking tank,” said Ten with wide eyes. “He’s a tank and I want to be run over.”

“Okay. That’s very nice. I’m proud of you.”

“And I swear to god I’ve never in my  _ life _ tasted sweeter c—”

“NO,” screamed Jaehyun, slapping a hand over Ten’s mouth, “STOP. THAT’S ALL.”

“Fshdg,” said Ten into Jaehyun’s hand, which Jaehyun removed so he could double over laughing, and Ten pulled him up and wrapped his arms around him and they laughed into each other’s shoulders. Jaehyun felt better for a bit. He was lucky to have Ten.

Jaehyun had midterms that week. He only went into the café once, with Ten, not to work but to study, and to try to bum free food off Taeil or Jisung. Despite how badly Jaehyun wanted to see him—even for a second, as long as he was smiling, as long as he wasn’t breaking into tears the way he had been when Jaehyun had left his house Sunday morning—Taeyong wasn’t there. He considered sending him an audio message, in the hopes of getting one back and hearing his voice, but thought about what Ten had said about giving him time.

Thursday night, Yuta was at his house again to watch horror movies with Ten. Jaehyun stayed in his room to study. Even with his earphones in, he could hear Yuta screaming outside and Ten saying that it wasn’t that scary. He tried to ignore them. After a few hours, he heard a knock on his bedroom door.

“It’s open,” he called, and turned around to find not Ten, but Yuta peeking his head through the door. Jaehyun stood up from his desk chair and Yuta, whose cheeks were full of some sort of candy, shook his head. “No, no, sit down,” he said around the candy.

“You want to come in?” said Jaehyun confusedly.

Yuta nodded. “Mm. Can I?”

Jaehyun looked around and said, “Sure, uh, sit on the bed.”

Yuta did so, leaning one hand behind him and resting the other, which was holding a half-eaten mochi, on his knee. He put the rest of the mochi in his mouth and chewed.

“How’s the movie…?” Jaehyun asked.

Yuta swallowed. “We just finished one. It was good. Ten’s looking for another one right now while I talk to you.”

“Uh huh,” said Jaehyun.

Yuta licked his fingers and said, “Okay, so, three things. First, Ten says you think I hate you. I don’t hate you. I didn’t like you that much when I met you, but that’s because I’d heard about you already, and you had Taeyong really shook and I was freaked out for him. So I guess I judged you. That’s on me. I’m sorry.”

“Oh,” said Jaehyun. “Uh, it’s okay.”

Yuta shook his head. “No. I really want to say sorry. Ten and I were talking about the whole thing, you guys and your whole…thing,” he said, waving a hand at Jaehyun, “and Ten told me he was with you when you got color, and you didn’t even know Taeyong was blind yet.”

Jaehyun stared at his classical music notes. “Nope.”

Yuta pushed his hair back with one hand and said, “He also said you’re the most wholesome and well-intentioned human he knows, but you have no clue what to do with emotions, especially if they’re yours.”

“Oh, okay,” said Jaehyun.

“And uh,” said Yuta, looking up at the art posters on Jaehyun’s ceiling, “well, I’ve been really happy this week, and on the subway ride over here, I was just thinking…how much it must have sucked for you. To get color without your soulmate getting color at the same time. I don’t know. Before this week, I didn’t understand how it makes you feel.” He nodded slowly and said, “Yeah. It must have sucked to be alone with that.” 

Jaehyun nodded too and said, “Thanks.”

“I was wrapped up in worrying about how Taeyong was feeling,” said Yuta, “like, obviously, because he’s my best friend. But Ten said you’ve been going kind of crazy too. So I wanted to say thank you. I didn’t think about how much you’ve been holding back.”

“I think I fucked that up last weekend, though,” Jaehyun whispered.

Yuta put his elbows on his knees. “Listen. I was ready to murder you with these hands last weekend. But Taeyong told me what you guys talked about and honestly, you were right.”

Jaehyun nodded several times. He wasn’t sure how to respond.

“So the last thing I wanted to say to you,” said Yuta, “is hi, from Taeyong, because he told me to say hi to you when I left today.”

“He did?” said Jaehyun as Yuta stood up from the bed.

“Yeah. I think he misses you,” said Yuta. “Like, really misses you. I’ll shut up before I expose him more. See you later, Jaehyun.”

“Wait!” Jaehyun said, and Yuta, who had been halfway out the door, leaned his head backwards into the room.

“So, would it be, uh, do you think I should send him a message, just to…”

“Yes,” said Yuta, “go for it,” and his purple head vanished.

Jaehyun sat frozen for a bit and then he grabbed his phone and opened his chat with Taeyong. They’d never messaged before, except once when Taeyong had asked for Taeil’s number because he couldn’t get ahold of Jungwoo. He raised the phone to his face, held down the audio button, said nothing for several seconds, scrapped the audio and started over. “Hey Taeyong,” he recorded, “how are you doing?” and sent the message.

He stared at his phone waiting for an answer for several seconds and then forced himself to return to his notes. The reply message came in after four minutes. Taeyong’s voice was soft. “Hi. Uh. I’m okay, how are you? It’s nice to hear from you. Woo said you had exams all week.”

Jaehyun listened to the message three times and then replied, “Yeah, I had two exams yesterday and I have one more in two days. It’s—nice to hear from you too. Have you been holding down the café or have Yangyang and Jisung burned it to the ground while I was gone?”

Taeyong answered right away. “Jesus, you have an exam on a Saturday? How were the ones yesterday? Did they go okay? You should get back to studying. The café’s fine. I can’t believe you just shaded Jisung like that. He’s just a sweet baby. Yangyang doesn’t need an accomplice, he’d burn down the place all by himself.”

Jaehyun abandoned his notes and threw himself onto his bed. “Yeah, the exam schedule’s weird. It’s okay. It gives me an excuse not to work Saturday. The exams yesterday were fine, thanks for asking. And, I mean, yeah, probably, I should get back to studying, but it’s boring. I’m not concerned about Jisung himself, I’m concerned that he wouldn’t stop Yangyang if Yangyang walked in one day like, ‘Yo, Jisung, today I’m gonna commit arson.’”

“You make a point,” Taeyong said in his message back a few minutes later. “He probably wouldn’t stop him. But rest assured that if that has happened, then Jisung must have interceded, because Cranberry Café is still standing. Luckily for us and our income. Uh…I don’t want to keep distracting you the night before your last exam. When do you work next?”

Jaehyun pouted at his phone for a minute, but Taeyong was right. He really needed to do well on this exam. “It’s no problem, you’re fine. But yeah. I should study. I don’t work till Monday, what about you?”

“Oh, I work Monday too,” said Taeyong. “So...see you then for sure. And maybe you can come over to our place the next time Ten comes to see Yuta or something, like, next week or whatever.”

“Yeah, see you Monday definitely. And yeah, we should hang out with Yuta and Ten and—yeah. Yuta and I are friends now, so, that’s cool,” said Jaehyun.

The reply was short. “I told you he would have to like you eventually.” Another audio message came in a moment later. “Sorry. My finger slipped. I also, I wanted to say good luck on the exam.”

“Yeah,” Jaehyun sent back, “you were right. Thanks.”

“Good night, Jaehyun.”

“Good night Taeyong.”

Two days later, on Saturday afternoon, Taeyong sent Jaehyun an audio message asking how his exam had gone. Jaehyun only saw the notification just before going into the exam itself at dinnertime, and sent back while standing outside the class, “Hey, sorry I didn’t—I was cramming and I had my phone on silent. I’m about to take my exam right now. Hah. Talk to you after.”

When he walked out of the exam an hour and a half later, Taeyong had sent a reply. They exchanged messages back and forth for two hours, through Jaehyun taking the bus home and getting dumpling soup downstairs from his apartment, until Taeyong said that he had to go because Mark was taking him to a concert. Ten had already left to spend the night with Yuta. Jaehyun went over to Kun and Johnny’s house so he wouldn’t have to be alone.

Monday was the hottest day of the year so far. The cherry blossoms had long since faded, but the May warmth had replaced their tender glow with heartier, shinier bursts of red and yellow, and green, so much green. Usually Jaehyun took the subway to work, but when he walked to the café with Ten on Monday, he was almost disappointed to step off the fragrant, color-drenched street.

Of course, the sight of Taeyong’s smile was more vivid than any summer-scented spring afternoon, the same way its absence when he left again was deeper and more impenetrable even than the endless warm night.


	5. Touch

As Jaehyun turned onto his block on his way home from work, he looked up at his building, scanning for the two windows of the apartment he shared with Ten. Six floors up and three windows from the left. Ten’s bedroom light was on. So he and Yuta were already back from their date. Jaehyun paused his music, took his earphones out and inhaled the evening air. Even after nine o’clock, it had a kind of sunbaked smell. He stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. It seemed strange, even faintly ridiculous, that Taeyong wasn’t here with him right now, tasting the first breath of summer, hands cold even in the heat.

He stood there looking past the white glow of the convenience store on the corner up at the starlike array of square lights along the façade of the apartment building for several seconds, until his phone buzzed in his pocket and he took it out to find an audio message from Lee Taeyong. A sob rose in his chest. He closed his eyes for a second.

“Hey,” said Taeyong’s voice on the message. “I felt like I didn’t get a chance to talk to you much at work today. I guess we never—there’s never much chance to talk at work. Uh…how…what’s up?”

Jaehyun got himself together and began walking. “Yeah, it’s never enough. I’m just walking home…listening to music and stuff. It’s really nice out. I miss you.”

Taeyong’s message seemed to come in less time than the audio itself lasted. “What are you listening to?”

“You know the song ‘ _ Sun & Moon’ _ by Kim Doyoung?”

“No,” said Taeyong. “Sing some?”

Jaehyun stopped outside the entrance of his building and leaned his back against the cement pillar outside the door. “ _ I see you even with my eyes closed,”  _ he sang into the speaker. _ “I hear you even with my ears covered, when I think of you. Even if you’re in a place where I can’t touch you, I can feel you _ .”

After a bit, Taeyong answered. “I might—know it. Sing a little more.”

“ _ When my moon rises,”  _ Jaehyun complied _ , “your sun rises under the same sky. In this disjointed time, our hearts are connected under the same sky. You and I, you and I, you and I, secrets that are only ours…you and I, you and I, you and I, the two of us like one _ .”

Jaehyun felt like he was waiting for a reply for a lifetime under the shadow of the overhang in front of his apartment building. But when his phone buzzed again and he looked at the clock, only three minutes had passed.

“The song’s beautiful.” There was a short silence, two or three seconds, and then, “Can you come over? I mean, do you have time to talk? To come over?”

Jaehyun glanced up the street. The 76 bus was pulling up to the bus stop. He stared at it for a moment, then began to sprint. He was still meters away when the girl at the end of the line got onto the bus and the doors began to shut.

“WAIT,” he shouted, skidding to a stop and slapping a hand flat against the closed doors. The driver glared at him through the glass, but the doors cranked open with a hiss. Jaehyun boarded, said thank you, and bowed several times. The bus driver glowered at him, closed the doors, and stepped on the gas.

When Taeyong opened the door to his apartment, it was dark inside. “Are you all right? Is everything okay?” Jaehyun asked, looking him over.

“No, everything’s fine,” Taeyong said, “everything’s okay.” He stepped back slightly and said, “Thanks for coming over.”

“Of course,” said Jaehyun as he went inside, taking off his shoes and laying them on the rack.

Taeyong moved past him and then halted, saying, “Uh—shit. Are the lights on? I can’t remember.”

“It’s okay,” said Jaehyun, “I’ll get them.”

“Thanks,” Taeyong said as Jaehyun reached for the lightswitch and sat on the arm of the couch.

“What,” said Jaehyun, and coughed, “what did you want to talk about?”

Taeyong stood in front of him, and with Jaehyun perched on the arm of the couch, Taeyong was a little taller, so Jaehyun had to look up into his face. Taeyong’s lips were parted, and not smiling, but somehow still giving the impression of a smile, like a closed flower before dawn. 

“Last week, Yuta said sometimes, when he looks at Ten,” said Taeyong, “he feels like he’s looking into a mirror.”

He twisted his hands and then dropped them to his sides. They pressed against his jeans.

“And I figured I’d never get that,” he said, “like, never have the sensation of looking at someone else’s face and seeing yourself. I just—figured I wouldn’t understand. But I do. I get it.”

Jaehyun’s chest tightened.

“There’s this feeling,” said Taeyong, a little breathlessly, hands coming up to gesture in front of him, “when you speak…your voice…it’s like an echo. Like I’m hearing a part of myself, bouncing back at me. Even when I haven’t said anything.”

Jaehyun stood up, cutting the distance between them in half. “I heard it when you sang,” Taeyong went on, “and I realized I always hear it, when you say my name, when I listen to your messages, I hear it. Like there’s a piece of myself, outside of me. I don’t—I don’t want it to be outside of me anymore.”

“Taeyong,” Jaehyun whispered.

“I need you to be with me,” Taeyong said.

Jaehyun breathed out. “I love you.”

Taeyong nodded. “I know,” he said, “I know now.” He raised his hand, paused, and said, “Jaehyun, can I touch you?”

“Yes,” said Jaehyun and closed his eyes.

He felt Taeyong’s fingertips on his chin first, light and cool. They wandered over his lips, and down the bridge of his nose, and then Taeyong cradled his cheeks in both hands, and he let his face lean into them. Taeyong’s hands brushed over his eyes, traced his eyebrows, and combed through his hair, pushing it back from his face. Then he felt the pressure of Taeyong’s lips against his own.

The kiss was slow and burned without flickering, like a distant planet gleaming while the stars around it waver. Taeyong’s fingers were motionless in Jaehyun’s hair and Jaehyun’s hands had risen to cup Taeyong’s chin. The clock ceased to mark the passage of time and instead only repeated itself again and again, announcing another iteration of the same second with the same deferential tick.

They stood still when their lips separated, breathing each other’s breath. 

“I love you too,” Taeyong said, almost silently, as if the words were unintended to be spoken aloud. Jaehyun drank each syllable into his lungs. Taeyong’s hands, cold a minute ago, had grown warm.

When their mouths met again, something like an electric current passed between them, some imbalance balancing. Jaehyun felt Taeyong shiver. He circled his arms around him, and Taeyong’s hands went down his neck and onto his shoulders, running over his arms, curiously, unreservedly, moving to his chest, his abdomen. His touch was dizzying. They fell onto the couch, Taeyong straddling Jaehyun’s lap, and Jaehyun wrapped his arms tighter around him.

“What was it like?” Taeyong murmured into Jaehyun’s mouth a lifetime or a heartbeat later, and Jaehyun made a questioning noise. Taeyong, lips sealing and unsealing from Jaehyun’s, said, “Color.”

Their mouths pressed together and fell apart. “Like I’d been living in an alternate reality,” said Jaehyun. Push, pull. “And then you were there and I was back in the right universe.” Attract, repel. “The real one.”

“Home,” said Taeyong.

“Yeah. Home.”

“I feel it,” whispered Taeyong. His lips were winter and searing heat. “I feel it.”

Jaehyun figured that a fair amount of time must have passed when Ten and Yuta burst through the door of the apartment yelling Taeyong’s name, walking right past the couch in the direction of Taeyong’s room. Taeyong propped himself up on his elbow and said, “Hello,” and Ten turned around and screamed.

“You’re  _ here? _ ” said Yuta, staring at Jaehyun, who had sat up.

“What?” said Jaehyun.

“You…! What are you  _ doing? _ ” said Ten, his hands pressed on either side of his face.

Jaehyun frowned. Taeyong said, “Being soulmates, what does it look like we’re doing?”

Ten turned away, making a high “Ahhhh” noise. Yuta threw his hands above his head and said, “So y’all are, like, good?”

“Good,” said Taeyong, smiling a little, and Jaehyun said, “Yeah, good.”

“GOOD,” yelped Ten.

Yuta pointed at Jaehyun. “Ten said you were supposed to be home from work at 9:30 and then all of a sudden it was like 11, we thought you were dead on the side of the road somewhere—”

“What could possibly have led you to the conclusion that I was dead on the side of the road?” Jaehyun said as Taeyong sat up and scooted closer to him.

“You couldn’t have taken a second to answer your phones?” Ten said in a slightly hysterical voice, looking equal parts stressed and giddy.

“Uhh…I think my phone’s on silent,” said Jaehyun, looking around.

Taeyong, who was patting at his pants pockets, said, “I don’t even know where my phone is.”

Ten put a hand over his mouth and said to Yuta, “Oh god, they’re so innocent,” and Yuta said, “Okay, well, thanks for giving Ten a heart attack, fuckers. Hope it was worth it.”

“It was, and you know what, you two are dumb and dumber. If we both weren’t picking up our phones, couldn’t you connect the dots?” said Taeyong.

Yuta said, “Well, that was the idea, we wanted to know if you had heard from him, we just didn’t think you guys were at the point where—”

“Okay,” Ten interceded, taking Yuta’s arm, “okay, we’re leaving now. Sorry for interrupting your soulmating. Jaehyun, see you later. Or tomorrow. Or just see you soon. For the record, you look stunning together and we are thrilled for you.”

Yuta grinned and muttered something in Ten’s ear, who laughed and smacked him as he steered him to the door, saying over his shoulder, “Aufwiedersehen, my dear lovelies!” Yuta shouted “bye” as they shuffled out the door, and then they heard Ten wail, “Fuck me they’re fucking cute,” before the door fell shut behind them.

In the silence that Ten and Yuta left behind them, Taeyong pulled his shin up to sit cross-legged facing Jaehyun. Jaehyun doodled a star on Taeyong’s knee with one fingertip. Taeyong took his hand and traced the outline of it.

“I didn’t realize it was past 11,” said Taeyong.

“Yeah. Me neither.” Jaehyun pushed Taeyong’s mussed hair back from his forehead with the hand that Taeyong wasn’t playing with. “Pretty sure I thought time stopped for a while.”

“Yeah.” Taeyong’s fingers explored the creases on Jaehyun’s palm, the bumps of his knuckles. “Or else it did stop, and then when Ten and Yuta came in, we skipped forward to the present.”

Jaehyun laughed softly. “Is that how time works?”

“I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. From now on, rules don’t apply to us anymore.” Taeyong raised Jaehyun’s hand to his face and cradled it against his cheek. Jaehyun ran his thumb along the curve of Taeyong’s cheekbone.

“I don’t know that they ever did,” said Jaehyun.

“Maybe not,” Taeyong said. He kissed the side of Jaehyun’s hand, once and then again. Each kiss felt like a flower blooming between them.

“I can’t believe I get to be a part of your life now,” said Jaehyun in a low voice.

Taeyong shook his head, folding his hand over Jaehyun’s as he held it against his cheek. “A part of me.”

Jaehyun repeated Taeyong’s words in a whisper. “A part of you.”

Taeyong nodded and pressed Jaehyun’s hand against his lips again. “That’s how I knew. That you were right. That it’s you.”

“Mm?”

“I never felt that way with him,” said Taeyong. His hand gripped Jaehyun’s a little harder. “When you said to decide for myself the night of the company dinner, I tried to think about it, the next few days. I loved him. But I never,” he said, laughing a little, “I never felt like there was a piece of my soul walking around out there in the world. Like it would kill me to be separated from it. That’s…this is new.”

“You won’t have to be separated from it,” Jaehyun said. “You’ll always have me with you. You’ll always have me.”

“And you’ll always have me,” said Taeyong.

Jaehyun thumbed over his browbone and said, “I’m sorry I didn’t find you before him.”

“What are you apologizing for,” said Taeyong. “Take that up with fate.”

“In five years,” Jaehyun said, “we’ll have twice as much history as you ever had with him, and he’ll be a distant memory.”

Taeyong sat silently for a moment as Jaehyun’s free hand drew patterns on his thigh. His smile, even small like that, was a sun unto itself. He said, “He’s already gone.”

Jaehyun breathed in deeply. His fingers traced a flower, a sun, and then the letters of his name on Taeyong’s leg. Taeyong lifted Jaehyun’s hand from his cheek and moved it to Jaehyun’s chest, using Jaehyun’s fingers to trace the letters of his own name over Jaehyun’s heart. Jaehyun was so dizzy with love he thought he might dissolve into a shower of sparks.

“Jaehyun,” said Taeyong, “can you stay with me tonight?”

Jaehyun leaned his forehead against Taeyong’s.

“Yes,” he said.

Taeyong murmured into his skin, “Remember the other day when we were talking about Yangyang burning down the café and your exams,” and Jaehyun let out a breath of laughter in recognition.

Taeyong said, “You sent me a message telling me good night.”

“You sent me one too.”

“I couldn’t fall asleep the past three nights without listening to it,” said Taeyong, shifting his face so he spoke against the corner of Jaehyun’s mouth, “and imagining you were here with me.”

Jaehyun caught Taeyong’s lips in a kiss. Taeyong’s arms wrapped around Jaehyun’s neck. “I kept replaying it,” he said, “you saying my name, I kept listening to it. Pretending it was real.”

“Taeyong,” said Jaehyun, letting his lips dip to Taeyong’s again. Taeyong pressed into the kiss but Jaehyun broke it to repeat, “Taeyong,” and again, “Taeyong.”

“Jaehyun,” Taeyong breathed.

“Taeyong.”

It was summer.

Taeyong had been away. He’d gone to a baking competition in Japan. Jaehyun had desperately wanted to go with him, but he couldn’t miss two weeks of the classes he was taking for his audio engineering degree or of his internship at the music studio, so Mark had gone with Taeyong instead. It was the longest they’d ever been apart. They videocalled every other night, but things still felt off in the apartment they had moved into in January. Jaehyun made a playlist of songs that Taeyong liked and let it play on repeat through the apartment.

Taeyong was due to arrive home Monday night at 9. Jaehyun chopped up some tofu for the fried rice Taeyong had shown him how to make and sang along to the playlist. “ _ So take me home and don’t spare the horses, _ ” he sang, “ _ away to a gossamer breeze. I don’t need to build a house of stone. Wherever you are… _ ”

Suddenly Jaehyun realized there was another voice singing with him. There was a jarring moment of cognitive dissonance, where the information his senses were giving him didn’t match up with reality, and for a second he didn’t know which voice was his own. He trailed off and turned around to see Taeyong smiling in the doorway to the kitchen, his hip leaning against the door frame, singing, “ _ …is where I call home.” _

“WHAT,” said Jaehyun, dropping the knife and jumping to throw his arms around Taeyong, who giggled and buried his face in Jaehyun’s neck. Jaehyun pulled him in close to his body so Taeyong could feel every inch of him. “What’s happening? Aren’t you early?”

“I missed you,” Taeyong said into Jaehyun’s neck.

“You’re tickling my neck. I missed you so goddamn much. Oh, my god, you’re here.” Jaehyun hoisted Taeyong up into the air and Taeyong circled his legs around Jaehyun’s waist, hooking an arm onto the back of his neck and taking his jaw in his hand so he could kiss him. He tasted the same as he always did. Like summer and winter.

“What are you cooking, dear domestic partner?” said Taeyong, punctuating the sentence with another kiss.

“Kimchi fried rice, my darling,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong kissed him for a little longer and then said, “Well put me down, because it’s burning.”

“It’s—?” Jaehyun dropped Taeyong unceremoniously onto the ground and rushed back to the stove. Taeyong was right. The kimchi in the pan was charred and smoking. “Shit,” said Jaehyun. “How did you know that?”

“Because I could smell something burning,” said Taeyong. He was snickering.

“Did you just come in?” Jaehyun shuffled the blackened kimchi around the pan and dumped in the rice.

“Yeah.” Taeyong pulled out a chair but didn’t sit down. “The airline had some issue and they asked if anyone wanted to get on an earlier flight, and like, obviously.”

“Why didn’t you come in and yell ‘ _ I’m home _ ’ or something? Instead of just hovering back there like a creep?”

“You were singing Bruno Major. I could hear from outside the door.”

“So?”

“ _ So? _ Interrupting that would be like…fucking…knocking over the Leaning Tower of Pisa. It’s not right.”

“You can hear me sing anytime you want,” said Jaehyun. He threw the tofu into another pan with some soy sauce and it sizzled. He stirred it with a spatula. “You made my brain break for a second. I swear to god I heard you singing and I got so confused I thought it was my own voice I was hearing.”

“Sure,” said Taeyong. Jaehyun felt Taeyong’s hands on his shoulders, massaging them gently, his forehead falling between Jaehyun’s shoulder blades. “That’s because it was.”

“No it wasn’t,” said Jaehyun, laying down the spatula and leaning his head back.

“Your voice is an echo of mine,” said Taeyong. “And my voice is an echo of yours.”

Jaehyun turned around and Taeyong’s hands fell to his hips.

“You said that the first time we kissed,” said Jaehyun.

Taeyong nodded. His hair was black now, and Jaehyun still hadn’t gotten used to it. He was stunning. “It’s true. Try it. Say my name.”

Jaehyun put his arms around Taeyong’s waist.

“Taeyong,” he said.

“Jaehyun,” Taeyong answered.

Jaehyun heard it. He wasn’t sure he ever had before.

“They’re the same,” he said.

Taeyong nodded and kissed him with smiling lips. “Because we’re the same.”

Jaehyun was still. He’d thought he understood what Taeyong meant the first day that he told him he loved him. He hadn’t. Not until this moment.

“Now save the tofu because it’s about to turn to charcoal too,” said Taeyong, letting him go. Jaehyun spun around and said, “Oh, shit,” again. Taeyong laughed and laid his head against Jaehyun’s back again, wrapping his arms around his stomach. He hummed along to the song that was playing. Jaehyun felt the vibrations of Taeyong’s voice in his own body, as if they were coming from himself.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading <3 thanks also to my prompter and to the mods of jaeyong fest!!


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